


It Had To Be You

by FullOnLarrie



Category: One Direction (Band), When Harry Met Sally (1989)
Genre: Complete, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Hate to Love, If you know the movie you'll know they're not around long, Infidelity, Light Angst, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Please don't be put off by the OMCs, When Harry Met Sally - Freeform, but not between louis and harry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 15:22:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 45,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10642614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FullOnLarrie/pseuds/FullOnLarrie
Summary: Harry and Louis are strangers who share the long drive from Chicago to NYC after college. They don't have anything in common, don't get along, and at the end of their trip, they're both glad to say goodbye.During a chance meeting five years later, they find that nothing has changed, and they part ways expecting never to see each other again.Ten years after their post-college road trip, Louis and Harry meet once again, but this time they become friends. Eventually, things get complicated.AWhen Harry Met SallyAU.





	1. 1995

**Author's Note:**

> Big thanks for the encouragement I've gotten from so many people about this fic. I really hope I did it justice and I hope you like it. It's quite difficult to take a movie and make a fic out of it without turning it into a script of the dialogue. I won't do it again! But I think I did alright. 
> 
>  
> 
> As always, thank you to my wonderful beta [Nic](http://louandhazaf.tumblr.com)❤
> 
> If you like the fic, please comment, leave kudos ❤, and/or reblog this [Tumblr post](http://fullonlarrie.tumblr.com/post/159637603505/it-had-to-be-you-by-fullonlarriea-when-harry-met)!
> 
> Come say hello on [Tumblr.](http://fullonlarrie.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
> Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author/screenwriter. I am in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any previously copyrighted material. No copyright infringement is intended.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **If you’d like to translate any of my fics, feel free, but please post the translation on ao3, and send me a link so that I can include it in the author’s notes.**
> 
> **Please do not post this fic or any of my other fics on any other websites.**

“Yes, mom, I’m fine. I’m driving up with a friend of Tyler’s… his boyfriend actually.” Harry folded his cardigan, slipped it into his backpack, and sat back down on the bare mattress of his dorm bed. He listened to his mom while looking around at the empty shelves that had held his books for four years and the blank walls that had been covered in his roommate’s ridiculous posters. “It’s like an eighteen hour drive, so we can take turns driving and go straight through.” He wiggled his toes inside his topsiders. “Mmhmm. Yeah, mom, I’ll call you when I get there.” Harry stood up and stretched, scratched at the short hair above his ear, then straightened the collar of his Izod shirt, and smoothed the pleated front of his khaki pants. “Yeah, I gotta drop my key at the Resident Director’s office… Love you, too, mom. Bye.” He placed the phone in the cradle on the wall, slung his backpack over both shoulders, and walked out of his dorm room for the last time. 

Harry popped open the hatchback of his old Honda Civic and adjusted his suitcases, carefully fitting his backpack between the glass of the heavy monitor of his HP computer and the side of the car to cushion it for the journey. He reached up and carefully closed the door, pulling on it to make sure the latch caught. There was plenty of room in the back seat for Tyler’s boyfriend to fit his stuff. Harry yanked open the driver’s side door and slid into the seat. 

He couldn’t wait for New York, where he wouldn’t need this beat-up, old car. While he waited for his favorite tape to rewind, Harry pulled the map out of the glove compartment and studied the route he’d planned, checking things off of his to do list, and adding more to the bottom. He’d already decided when and where they’d stop to get gas, eat, and trade off driving shifts. He drew little stars on the map at each designated stop to make them easier to see, then carefully folded the map and put it back into the glove compartment. His tape finally finished rewinding, so he pressed play, then shifted into drive and left campus. 

Tyler’s boyfriend lived off-campus at one of the frat houses. He was supposed to be waiting outside and Harry hoped that he would be, he certainly wasn’t about to get out of his car and go inside a frat house. 

Shania had just started to sing the chorus of “Any Man of Mine” when Harry pulled up outside of the address that Tyler had given him. He turned off the tape deck and slowly pulled into the driveway. Or he would have, but Tyler was standing in the middle of it, wrapped completely around his boyfriend as they made out, totally unaware of Harry’s presence or of the fact that his car was still halfway in the road. It was like watching some sort of flannel, baggy denim, and dirty converse vertical wrestling match. With tongue. Harry gave them a few seconds, but when they didn’t come up for air, he laid on the horn until they separated and moved out of the way. 

With his most gracious smile plastered on his face, Harry pulled the rest of his car into the driveway and looked up at the couple, who were still clinging to each other, kissing messily and saying their goodbyes. 

Harry forced his eyes not to roll when Tyler said, “I love you,” and his boyfriend returned his sentiments in a sickeningly sweet voice along with the promise to call every time they stopped on the way to New York. Instead, Harry ignored them and climbed out of the car. 

Once the happy couple finally wrenched their bodies apart, Tyler called out, “Hey, Harry. This is Louis, my boyfriend.” Then he picked up Louis’ bags and hauled them around to the passenger side of the car. “Thanks for taking care of him on the way to New York.”

Hopefully the entire trip wouldn’t consist of back to back moments where Harry had to fight the urge to roll his eyes; he’d end up with a migraine for sure. He nodded at Tyler and stuck his hand out to properly introduce himself to Louis. “I’m Harry Styles. Pleasure to meet you. Tyler has said lovely things.” He tried to catch Louis’ eye, even dipped his head a bit, but Louis was looking at Harry’s extended hand, his mouth twisted in some sort of sideways grin. 

Just as Harry was about to drop his hand, Louis grasped it, but instead of shaking it, he proceeded to manipulate his hand into some sort of bizarre series of hand signals, ending with a slap against the palm of Harry’s hand. Once again, Harry had to suppress an eyeroll. 

Louis finally spoke, his voice light and a bit scratchy. “Nice to meet ya, Harry. I’m Louis. Don’t know what Tyler would say about me that’s lovely.” He pushed the passenger seat forward and squeezed his his bags through the opening, carelessly tossing them into the back seat.

The bags were going to fall off the seat as soon as the car turned a corner, Harry was sure. “Do you want to take the first driving shift?”

Louis was watching him, his head tilted to the side, and he was quiet for a few seconds before answering, “Nah, man, I’ll navigate.” 

●●●

“So, what’s your story, Harry?” Louis asked while digging through a grocery bag on the floor between his feet. 

“My story?” Harry kept his eyes on the road and his hands at ten and two o’clock. “I don’t have one, nothing’s happened to me yet. That’s why I’m going to New York. That’s where my story starts.”

Louis pushed his seat back and kicked his feet up onto the dash, leaning his elbow onto the center console. In one hand he held a bunch of grapes, which he offered to share with Harry, with the other hand he plucked one grape off and tossed it in the air, attempting to catch it in his mouth. He missed quite a few times, barely catching it in his hand before it rolled onto the floor.

“Yeah, so what story is that then?” Louis finally gave up and dropped the grape into his open mouth from a few inches above.

“I’m going to get my Master’s Degree in Journalism so I can be a reporter for the New York Times.”

Harry looked over just in time to see Louis turn his head and spit out the grape seeds; they spattered all over the inside of the window. Disgusted, Harry narrowed his eyes and turned his eyes back on the road.

“Guess I’ll roll the window down.” Louis said, and Harry could hear the smirk in his voice. This was already a long trip and they weren’t even out of town. “So you’re going to be a reporter to write about things that happen to other people.”

Harry rolled his eyes, he couldn’t help it that time. “I suppose you could look at it that way. There’s a lot going on in New York on a daily basis. I want to be a part of that. I think becoming a reporter is the best way for me to do it.” 

Louis started rambling on about dying alone, in an apartment surrounded by cats and Harry stopped listening after that. All he could do was keep driving and hope that he could keep his temper in check for the next eighteen hours. 

Music always helped pass the time, so Harry pushed play on his tape deck and started to hum along to Shania. She spoke to him; her enthusiastic voice and smart lyrics had turned him into a fan immediately. As she asked, “Whose bed have your boots been under?” Harry started to sing along, but stopped when Louis chuckled quietly. 

“What’s funny, Louis?”

Without answering, Louis straightened up in his seat, then unbuckled his seatbelt and climbed over the center console and stretched his upper body into the back seat, causing Harry to swerve slightly when he accidentally bumped his elbow. “What are you doing? I’m going seventy-five miles per hour on the interstate.” 

Harry's eyes flickered back and forth from the road to the rearview mirror. Louis was on his knees on the center console, leaning over the seat and digging around in his bag. The road, Harry needed to watch the road. He couldn’t stare at Louis’ bum in the rearview mirror. Or right next to his face. Yes, it was a nice bum, a really great one, actually, but the rest of him… Aside from being Tyler’s boyfriend, he was kind of obnoxious and looked like he hadn’t showered in days. Harry turned up the volume for “(If You’re Not In It For Love) I’m Outta Here!” and was singing along, happily ignoring the man clambering back into the passenger seat, that is until he turned off the music.

“Sorry, man, but I can’t listen to that shit.” Louis smacked a cassette tape against his hand a few times, while Harry silently argued with himself. He would survive the drive to New York, he wouldn’t become a murderer simply because this man had no manners.

With a death grip on the steering wheel, Harry took a deep breath, then almost saccharin sweet, said, “You don’t have to be rude, Louis. I realize that not everyone likes country music, even though it’s my opinion that Shania is more pop than country. By all means, go ahead and play your tape.”

“Great. Thanks. Um, sorry. Didn’t mean to be rude, just that’s how I talk to my friends.” Louis shrugged and grinned. “It’s a mixtape. Got a little of everything on it. Nirvana, Led Zeppelin, Smashing Pumpkins, Oasis, you know.”

Harry knew. He listened to all sorts of music. Pop, country, rock, jazz, blues, classical. For some reason, he didn’t want to give Louis the satisfaction of letting him know that. So he spent the next hour and a half pretending not to know the words to some of his favorite songs. Eventually, Louis nodded off in the passenger seat. Harry put Shania back on when Louis’ mixtape finished playing. It was almost like driving alone for a few hours. Harry listened to the music of his choice, changing out Shania for The Cranberries and bopping along until it was getting close to time to stop for gas. Navigator, yeah right. Good thing that most of the drive so far was a straight shot on the interstate. 

Harry tapped Louis on the shoulder repeatedly, poked him a little harder, then finally shoved him into the door.

Louis jerked awake and rubbed his eyes. “What?”

“Please can you check my list of stops?” Harry pointed to the glove compartment. “I’m pretty sure we’re supposed to take an exit up here to fill up the tank and switch places.”

After fumbling slightly with the latch, Louis found Harry’s map and notebook, confirmed that the next exit was the correct one, then started flipping through and reading Harry’s notes. “You have every stop planned out?”

“Mmhmm. The entire trip is planned to the last mile. It’s an eighteen hour drive, we’ll switch off every three hours and top off the gas tank. That way it never dips below a quarter of a tank.” Harry flipped on the turn signal, moved into the slow lane, decelerated, and took the next exit off the interstate. 

●●●

“You're so… positive and optimistic and happy.” Louis quickly took his eyes off the road to look over at Harry. “It’s just weird. No one is that happy in real life.”

Harry shook his head. “I am. I’m actually a happy person. What are you miserable or pessimistic or something?” 

From the passenger seat, Harry could surreptitiously observe Louis while he talked; he found that if he ignored most of what he was saying, and looked past the grungy exterior, he was actually quite lovely to look at.

“No. I’m not pessimistic. Life can be pretty shitty, so I’m prepared.” He must have known Harry was watching, because he pursed his lips and raised one eyebrow. “And, like yeah, I have a dark side.”

Harry snorted. God, he was really an absurd person. “A dark side. Like Darth Vader or something?”

“No, though I’m honestly surprised that you know _Star Wars_ —”

“Of course I know _Star Wars_. Everyone knows _Star Wars_.”

“Anyway, I just know what it’s like to have things be… not so great.” Louis shrugged one shoulder and dropped one hand from the steering wheel to rest it on the center console. “I’m a realist.”

“You think that makes you a better person?” Harry crossed his arms and turned a little bit in his seat so he could face his body toward Louis. “Because you’re negative all the time?”

“Not negative, realistic.”

“Whatever.” Harry sat back again and reclined his seat, crossing his arms behind his head. “You’re going to ruin your life waiting for bad shit to happen.”

Louis didn’t respond at first, so Harry figured the conversation was over and closed his eyes in the hopes of catching a quick nap before their next stop, but before he could doze off, Louis quietly commented, “Still surprises me that you’re a _Star Wars_ fan.”

Harry didn’t bother to open his eyes to reply. “I like movies.”

“Yeah, like modern ones or classic ones?”

“Both. I like all kinds of movies.” He could feel himself getting pulled back into the conversation, so he cracked open his eyes and peered at Louis while he talked. “ _Star Wars, Pulp Fiction, Forrest Gump, North by Northwest, Silence of the Lambs, Breakfast Club, Casablanca_ —”

“You like _Casablanca_?” Louis sounded genuinely surprised at that, as if Harry liking a classic film, one of _the_ classics, was shocking. “You probably hate that Ingrid Bergman leaves with her husband instead of staying with Bogart.”

Harry laughed and slapped his knee. Louis didn’t know him at all, but he sure seemed to think he did. “The exact opposite actually. I would’ve left too. Who wants to stay in Casablanca with a man who owns some bar? I’m practical. That _is not_ practical.”

“Yeah, okay.” Louis sped up to pass the only other car on the road. “I just can’t imagine leaving behind someone you love, the man you’ve had the most passionate relationship with, for that other guy. Just because it’s practical. Makes no sense… Unless—”

“Louis, it’s the next exit. We’ll stop for food and then I’ll drive.” Harry tapped his finger against the map. “Slow down, you’ve got to exit.” Harry squeaked and braced himself on the dash as Louis swerved into the turning lane without using his signal. “Shit! What are you doing?”

“There aren’t any cars around. It’s fine. Chill out.” Louis finally slowed down enough to take the exit. 

“Whatever, Louis. God, you're an awful driver. Just turn right up here, there’s a restaurant and a gas station next door.” Harry pressed himself back into the headrest and grabbed onto the handle above the window. “Do you like _Casablanca_?”

“Yeah, it’s a classic. My favorite part is the end though. Bogart says my name. _Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”_

“Was that supposed to be a Bogart impression? Wait. You said unless. Unless what?”

“Huh?” Louis turned the corner and looked over at Harry with a smirk. “Oh, yeah, well, it makes sense that you’d choose practical over passionate. Means you’ve never had a truly passionate relationship.” He put the car in park and climbed out.

Harry checked his hair in the mirror. No matter how short he kept it, his curls were out of hand, standing up off the top of his head. Maybe he should just grow it long. He hopped out of the passenger side and slammed the door. “That’s not true at all, Louis. I’ve had… what you said.”

“Nah, you can’t even say it. You’ve never had it. You haven’t had passion.” Louis opened the door to the restaurant, but turned around to say, “No way have you had really great sex,” before walking through the door and letting it close in Harry’s face.

There was no thinking involved, Harry was just pissed. How dare he, this man—boy, really—who didn't even know him say something like that. He yanked the door open to follow him inside and Louis was still talking as if he didn’t notice that he’d shut the door in Harry’s face.

“I have had passion, Louis. I’ve had great sex.” The restaurant was crowded and Harry cringed slightly when it went quiet after he spoke, but he wasn’t ashamed. Not at all. He sat down across from Louis and looked him straight in the eye. “I _have,_ Louis.”

The waitress brought over their menus along with a couple of glasses of water, and Louis held the menu up in front of his face, probably hiding from a conversation he hadn’t meant to start and didn’t intend to continue. 

Harry quickly decided what to order and waited patiently, his hands folded on the table. When the waitress returned to take their order, Louis dropped his menu and asked for the sandwich special. Harry ordered the chef salad. Olive oil and balsamic vinegar on the side. Bacon only if it was real bacon, not those fake bacon bits. And a slice of cheesecake with raspberry sauce on the side, but only if the sauce was made from real raspberries. None of that artificially flavored syrup, please.

The waitress’ eyes were very focused on her notepad as she scribbled out Harry’s order. Louis watched her writing, his grin getting bigger the longer it took for her to finish. “That was a fantastic order, Harry. Very… passionate.”

“God, you’re an ass.” Harry sipped his water, then leaned across the table. “I _have_ had really good sex.”

Louis crunched on the ice from his soda. “Yeah? Who with?”

Harry shook his head. “It’s _with whom._ And I’m not going to tell you.”

“I know it’s _with whom._ I just… I don’t like talking like that. Sounds weird.” Louis popped another piece of ice in his mouth. “So, with whom, then?”

Harry looked around, he couldn’t believe he was entertaining the thought of answering him, but Louis was still looking at him expectantly. “Fine,” Harry huffed. “Bernard Johnson.”

Louis barked a laugh. “Nope. No way. You did not have great sex with Bernard ‘Bernie’ ‘BJ’ Johnson.”

“I did too.”

“Alright, Harry, I believe you.” Louis rattled the ice around in his cup and signaled for the waitress. “I can hear it now.” Louis’ voice turned low, gruff and scratchy as he exaggerated, “ _Fuck me, Bernard. Harder, BJ. Oh yeah, ride me, Bernie.”_ He waved his hand in dismissal. “Nah, I just can’t see it.” 

Though he’d never said any of those things, Harry felt his face flushing at Louis’ imitation of his own voice.

The server brought their food and another soda for Louis. When she left, he continued, “So why’d you and Bernie break up?”

“What makes you think we broke up?”

“Because you wouldn’t be here with me if you were still with him.”

“I’m not with you. We’re just… carpooling.” Harry carefully drizzled the oil and vinegar over his salad. “If you must know, he was very jealous, so I ended it. He didn’t want me moving to New York without him.”

Louis smiled, his mouth full of food, and said, “Glad you got rid of him then. Guy sounds like a jerk anyway.”

They finished the rest of their meal in silence. Harry had really hoped that Louis would turn out to be a friend; he could use one in the city. Maybe they could get past their opposing viewpoints. At least they could meet up for lunch now and then. 

As he figured out his part of the bill and counted out his money, Harry could sense Louis looking at him.

“What?” Harry adjusted his hair, but Louis was still looking. He picked up his napkin and wiped around his mouth. Still looking. “What is it? Why are you looking at me?”

Louis smiled, a genuine smile. He had a nice smile, really. Sharp, white teeth and pink lips, and when he grinned like that, he got little crinkles beside his eyes. Harry shook his head. Ridiculous. It didn’t matter if he had a nice smile, he was dating Tyler and, well, he was kind of a jerk. 

Louis tilted his head to the side and, of course, ruined the moment by speaking. “You know, you’re very attractive. Tyler didn’t tell me you were this attractive.”

Harry stood up and slipped his wallet into his pocket. “Well, maybe he doesn’t think I’m attractive.”

“Nah. It’s not an opinion thing. You’re hot.”

Unbelievable. Harry’s mouth fell open. “Tyler is my friend. And you guys are together. I can’t believe you.” Harry walked towards the exit without checking to see if Louis was following.

Of course, Louis was right there behind him. “What?”

“I cannot believe you’re hitting on me.” Harry swung open the door and walked through it without holding it for Louis, a true testament to how bothered he was, Harry was always polite. 

“I’m not hitting on you.” Louis slipped through the door sideways and let it close behind him. “I just said you’re hot. And you are. It’s an objective observation. Science.”

“Whatever.” They stood on opposite sides of the car, staring at each other for a few seconds. Harry refused to break eye contact first.

“Fine, god, I take it back then.” Louis looked away, then back at Harry. “You’re not attractive, you’re not hot, you’re not pretty. Okay?”

“You—” Harry sputtered. “You can’t just take it back. It’s already out there now. You said it.” 

“Well, it’s true.”

“Louis.” Harry opened the driver’s side door, climbed into the car, and waited for Louis to sit down. “We’re _just_ going to be friends.”

As he buckled his seat belt, Louis snorted softly, then looked at Harry and rolled his eyes. “We can't be friends.”

“Why not?” Harry asked. It was actually possible that this guy was going to reject Harry's offer of friendship. Harry made friends with everyone, he prided himself on it. 

Louis gave him an appraising look and smirked. “Because, Harry, I've already said that I'm attracted to you. That I think you're hot. It's not like I can change that. So that'll always be there and it'll make things weird.” 

Harry pulled the car out of the restaurant parking lot and headed back toward the interstate. What a ridiculous idea. “I don't agree. I think you can be friends with people who you're attracted to. I have plenty of friends that I find attractive. I've had friends who've said they're attracted to me. And nothing was ever weird between us.”

“I don't believe it.” Louis shook his head, still smiling when he squinted his eyes. “No way have you been attracted to someone and voluntarily stayed just friends.”

“I have.”

Louis pursed his lips and Harry could see him watching him from the corner of his eye. “Who then? Give me an example.”

“What?”

“An example. Tell me who, just one person, who you're friends with and who you're attracted to.”

Harry glanced over to see Louis waiting for his answer, a smug grin on his face, like he'd already won the argument. 

So it needed to be someone good. Someone who Harry could prove was nothing more than a friend. The side of his mouth lifted into a crooked smile and he answered, “Tyler.”

As of he'd anticipated Harry's answer, Louis immediately barked a laugh and shook his head. “Nope. You're not attracted to Tyler.”

“What? He's nice looking.” Harry tried to keep his eyes on the road. “He's _your_ boyfriend.”

“Maybe. But you're not attracted to him. You don't think he's hot.” Louis laughed again. “No way have you ever wanted to fuck Tyler.” 

Carefully, Harry switched lanes to pass the tractor-trailer truck in front of them. He needed a distraction, a minute to think of a response. Because Louis was right, he'd never wanted to have sex with Tyler. Objectively Tyler was somewhat handsome, but not Harry's type at all. “Fine. You're right about Tyler.” 

“Knew it.” Louis fiddled with the lever on the side of the seat and tilted it back. “Proved my point anyway. Because I know for a fact that Tyler wanted to fuck you.”

“What? No he didn't.”

“He did. Told me so.” Louis pulled a gray beanie out of the back pocket of his baggy jeans and tugged it down over his hair. He pulled his hands inside his sleeves, crossed his arms and snuggled down on his side, facing Harry. “Doesn't matter anyway. You're like, super hot, even in your preppy clothes. I mean, some people like that sort of thing. So even if you're not attracted to these people, they're probably after you.” Louis yawned and didn't bother to cover his mouth. “You can't be friends with someone you find attractive. So we can't be friends. Because I'd do you in a heartbeat.”

The gasp that Harry let out was part shock at Louis’ frank statement and part surprise at his own disappointment at Louis’ insistence that they'd never be friends. 

●●●

They circled the block trying to find a place to park Harry's car and when they finally gave up and double parked, they were both about to drop from exhaustion. Harry helped Louis unload his things from the car and stood on the sidewalk watching him as he maneuvered his bags until he had them all on his back and arms, prepared to carry it all up in one trip. 

No handshake then, since Louis didn't have a free hand. “I guess, um, thanks for driving with me. It was nice to meet you, Louis.”

“Yeah, it was fun. Thanks for letting me ride with you.” Louis adjusted the bag on his shoulder. “Would’ve sucked to take the bus.”

Harry backed up and stepped off the sidewalk, raised his hand to wave goodbye and said, “I’d say that I’ll see you around, but since we can’t be friends… I won’t. It’s really too bad, you’re the only person I know in the city.” 

Louis pursed his lips, but then he smiled a little.

“Have a nice life, I guess.” 

“Yeah, you too, Harry.”

Harry climbed back into his car and drove away. It was better this way, they really had nothing in common, and Louis was really obnoxious, even if he was attractive. They’d probably end up doing nothing but fighting. Friendship just wasn’t in the cards for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you like the fic, please comment, leave kudos ❤, and/or reblog this [Tumblr post](http://fullonlarrie.tumblr.com/post/159637603505/it-had-to-be-you-by-fullonlarriea-when-harry-met)!
> 
> Come say hello on [Tumblr.](http://fullonlarrie.tumblr.com)


	2. 2000

“Thank you for bringing me to the airport. It’s so sweet of you.” Harry murmured and wrapped his arms around his boyfriend’s neck. “I’m gonna miss you, Joe.” 

He leaned in for a kiss, nothing obscene, he wasn’t about to start making out in an airport of all places. But, a few more kisses and Harry was reconsidering his stance on making out in public. He hummed against Joe’s lips and smiled. From the corner of his eye, he could see a man walk past them and stop, only to back up and stand next to them. Harry gently pushed Joe back a few inches, so they could see what this person wanted, but when he did, Harry recognized him right away. His blood pressure shot up immediately. 

Though, it seemed like Louis didn’t recognize Harry.

“Joe?” Louis sounded unsure, but when Joe turned to fully face him, he said, “Joe. I thought it was you. Louis Tomlinson.” While they shook hands, Harry looked down at his feet. With his hair long and curly, he looked very different than he had five years previous. If he stayed quiet, maybe Louis would move on from the conversation without noticing him. “Are you still with the D.A.’s office?”

Joe smiled, his professional lawyer smile, and replied smoothly, “No, no, gave that up. I’m on the other side now. What about you, Louis?” The longer the conversation, the higher the chance the Louis would recognize him, even with his long hair and business suit. 

“Oh, I’m working as a political consultant with a smaller law firm. I love it.”

“Sounds great, man.” Joe reached over and clapped Louis on the shoulder. Harry turned his head to look in the opposite direction, hoping that they’d finish their conversation and move on. No such luck. “Oh, Louis, this is Harry Styles. Harry, this is Louis Tomlinson. We, um, we used to live in the same building.”

Well, this was it. Harry stuck out his hand to shake Louis’, fully expecting him to recognize him by name, but if he did, he didn't mention it. Louis still had the same bright blue eyes, but a clean-shaven face, and shorter hair that was swept up and back. Gone were the torn, baggy jeans, dirty converse, and worn flannel shirt. Instead, he was dressed in a sharp, gray suit. They shook hands quickly and Louis excused himself to catch his plane. Harry heaved a sigh of relief and rested his head on Joe’s shoulder.

“Are you alright?” Joe smoothed a hand down Harry’s back. 

Harry straightened himself, rolled his shoulders back and said, “I’m fine. That guy though. I’m glad he couldn’t place me. Five years ago, we drove eighteen hours from college to New York together.” Harry shook his head and brushed his curls back. “He was rude, and just… it wasn’t pleasant. He hit on me and I told him no. He was dating a friend of mine… Oh, wow.” Harry pinched his bottom lip and thought for a few seconds. “What was his name? I can’t remember.”

“What happened after you told him no?”

“Oh, um.” Harry thought back about the rest of the trip to New York, the weird conversations about attraction and friendship, and the soft snuffling sound Louis had made while he’d slept in the passenger seat. The odd goodbye when he’d dropped him off at his apartment building. “Oh, nothing. Nothing happened. Well, I said we could be friends and he said we couldn’t be friends because he was attracted to me.” Harry shrugged, but as he wrapped his arms around Joe’s waist he remembered the rest of that conversation. How blunt Louis had been, owning up to the fact that he’d wanted Harry like that, even though he’d had a boyfriend. “What was his name? You know, Joe, you should run away from me while you can.” Harry giggled quietly and smoothed the lapels of Joe’s suit jacket. “I can’t even remember the name of the guy I was such good friends with that I wouldn't get involved with his boyfriend.”

Joe trailed a finger down Harry’s jawline and tipped his chin up to capture his lips in a kiss. “Your flight is soon. You’d better go.” 

“Tyler. That was his name. Wow, pulled that one out of nowhere.” Harry leaned in for another kiss and sighed against his lips. “You’re right though, I should go.” 

When Harry tried to step back, Joe held fast to his wrist. “Hey, I’ll miss you, and, um, I love you.”

“You do?” Harry’s heart thumped in his chest and he couldn’t hide his surprise. They’d been dating for a little less than a month.

With a nod, Joe whispered, “I do.”

A wide grin spread across Harry’s face, you could hear the smile in his voice when he replied, “I love you, too.”

●●●

Harry carefully placed his bag into the overhead compartment and settled down into his seat with his book. A middle seat, which he was none too happy about. With his long legs, he preferred the aisle, but the man in the aisle seat next to him had his nose buried in a book and was listening to his Discman, and Harry didn’t want to interrupt. He’d wait until they came by to offer drinks, then he’d ask him to trade places. In the meantime, he opened his brand new copy of _Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire_. He didn’t get far in the book before his mind drifted back to Joe. They were good together, they had so much fun, and though it did seem a little fast to say “I love you” when they’d been together less than a month, it felt good to finally be at that point. To have found someone to love and be happy with, hopefully long-term, and at only twenty-six years old… Harry felt lucky. 

A rattling noise pulled Harry out of his thoughts and he looked up to see the flight attendant pushing the beverage cart down the aisle—just what he needed to relax a bit on the flight, so his nerves didn’t get the best of him. He’d have one drink, that would be plenty. 

The man in the aisle seat ordered a beer, then the flight attendant turned to Harry and politely asked, “Would you care for a beverage, sir?”

Harry sat forward a bit and leaned over to make eye contact. “Yes, please. Do you have club soda?”

The flight attendant nodded, so Harry continued. “Great. I’ll have a vodka and club soda. Soda. Not tonic. With a lemon wedge, not a lime. Do you have crushed ice?”

When the flight attendant shook her head, Harry smiled and continued, “That’s fine. Since you don’t have crushed ice, I’d like for you to put four cubes of ice in the cup. The ice on the bottom, then pour the vodka in, then the club soda. Lemon, not lime, but the lemon on the side, not in the cup. Please.”

“Yes, sir.” She nodded and made Harry’s cocktail, then continued taking orders from the other passengers, and Harry sat back with his drink and opened his book again. 

It was just a few seconds later that he could feel someone pulling on his headrest, so he turned to ask them to please stop, but was instead faced with Louis. Again. Before he could say anything, Louis smiled at him and Harry forgot what he wanted to say.

“University of Chicago, right?” Louis asked, still leaning on the back of Harry’s seat.

Harry nodded curtly. 

“Did you look this good back then?”

He should have been shocked at Louis’ brazenness, but five years of living in the city, grad school, and working as a journalist had made Harry almost immune to inappropriate questions, so he quickly answered, “No. I looked quite different then.” Harry reached up to touch his long curls without thinking, then snatched his hand back down.

Louis studied Harry’s face and he could feel himself unwillingly starting to blush. “Did we ever… You know. Hmm?” Louis winked lewdly and Harry cursed himself for answering in the first place.

“No, we did not.” Harry answered curtly and tried to go back to his book and ignore Louis, but he caught the man next to him curiously watching their interaction and felt like he had to explain. “We drove to New York together after graduation.” He turned back to Louis. “You were dating my friend.”

“Oh, yeah. That’s right… What was his name?” Louis tapped a finger against his lips and hummed thoughtfully. “Taylor?”

Harry huffed and turned back to look at Louis. “Tyler. His name was Tyler.” He shook his head. “I can’t believe you didn’t remember his name.”

The man in the aisle seat had continued to watch Louis and Harry interact and interrupted them to offer to switch seats so they could sit together. Before Harry could say no, Louis was already saying yes and standing in the aisle. Great. Harry was going to spend the next four hours having uncomfortable conversation with a man that he hadn’t planned to ever see or speak to again. He sighed heavily as Louis made himself comfortable and Harry decided that he’d ask him to switch seats as soon as the flight attendant was finished serving drinks.

“So, um, you were going to be a… gymnast?”

Harry rolled his eyes. That was familiar. He'd probably strain his eyes before the plane landed. “Journalist.” 

“Oh, yeah.” Louis smiled as though that was what he’d meant to say all along. “How’s that working out?”

“It’s great, thanks. I work for the New York Post.” It was doubtful that Louis even cared, really, and it was possible that he was going to start coming on to Harry again. Harry steeled himself for that, just in case.

Louis leaned forward and caught Harry’s eye. It was honestly unfair that he was so good looking. His eyes were just amazing, a brilliant blue. Too bad he was such an ass every time he opened his mouth. “And you’re with Joe? That’s great.” Louis swirled his drink, gin and tonic, the smell was very specific. “You’ve been together how long? A month?”

Harry frowned. He didn’t see this going well. “Just about. Why?”

“Oh, well, because he brought you to the airport. That’s something people do when they’re in a new relationship. Of course, eventually they stop doing that, and it’s all downhill from there. It’s why I’ve never taken anyone I’ve dated to the airport. Never will.” Louis leaned his head back with a smug smile.

“You know, it’s really amazing.” Harry turned to fully face Louis. “You look like a normal person, but then you open your mouth and you’re like… the angel of death.” It was unusual for Harry to say something like that. Sure, he would speak his mind in pretty much any situation, but he always tried to be kind or at the very least cordial, but something about Louis brought out a… nastier side of him. 

Of course, Harry’s comment didn’t phase Louis at all, it was as if he didn’t hear it, because he immediately asked, “Do you think you’d get married, you know, if you could?”

“We’ve only known each other for a month. Besides, it’s not like we could get married if we wanted to. And neither one of us is ready for that sort of commitment anyway.” 

“I’m going to get married. Eventually. We’re going to Vermont for the civil union, you know, it’s symbolic.” 

“Really?” Harry almost laughed, it seemed so unbelievable. Who would want to be with Louis enough to do that?

Louis nodded. “Yep.”

“No way.” Harry finally laughed. It had to be a joke. “Who is he?”

“Christopher Glass. He’s a doctor. We’re already living together, so it’s just sort of taking it to the next level.”

“Wow. I would never have thought… Good for you, Louis.” Harry chuckled. “You were literally the most negative, pessimistic person I’d ever met. I would never have taken you for the life-long commitment type. This is, well, quite a turnaround. What changed?”

Louis hummed and pursed his lips before answering, “Well, you know, you just get tired of the same old routine, you know? Go out, get drunk, dance with your friends, meet someone, go home with them, have sex. Then there’s that weird in-between time where you’re trying to figure out if you can leave or not. Like, do they expect you to stay the night? Especially cuddlers. You’re just lying there in the dark with some dude drooling on your shoulder or sweating all over you, and you want to get up and go home, but you can’t. It’s just… tiring. Now I don’t have to do that anymore.” He grinned at Harry as if he’d found the ever elusive meaning of life.

Wow. Harry couldn’t possibly be happier that he sidestepped any and all interactions with Louis over the last five years. Hopefully, after they disembarked from the plane, they’d never see each other again. “You’re really just an asshole, Louis. Unbelievable.”

“Oh are you one of the drooling cuddlers? I bet you like to be held all night, don’t you?” 

There was nothing Harry could say to that. Yes, he liked to be held all night, he actually preferred to be the little spoon, but no way was he going to admit that out loud to Louis. Instead, he sat back, sipped his drink, and opened his book. He’d stay in the middle seat; he didn’t intend to speak to Louis again for any reason.

Harry managed to get off the plane ahead of Louis, he wasn’t sure how, but he’d grabbed his bag from the overhead compartment and made for the exit without looking back. He stood on the moving sidewalk, reading his book, his bag on his shoulder. Someone cleared their throat beside him and Harry closed his book, ready to step out of the way in case someone needed to pass by him. He turned to look, but of course, it was Louis again. 

Louis adjusted his bag and leaned closer to Harry’s ear. “Are you staying in town?” His breath tickled the skin of Harry’s neck and Harry tried to suppress a shiver.

“Yes.” Harry hissed out and stepped sideways to put some space between them. The hotel room waiting for him had a small balcony and a jacuzzi tub that he planned to take full advantage of. 

“Do you want to have dinner?”

Harry’s head swung around and he clenched his jaw, drawing his eyebrows together. He couldn’t believe this guy.

Louis shrugged. “As friends.”

“You said we couldn’t be friends.” As if Harry would want to be friends with him now. He took a deep breath through his nose and pictured himself in his hotel room, a bubble bath, room service. Alone.

“What? When did I say that?”

“On the ride to New York. After you came onto me, I turned you down, offered to be your friend, and you said that you could never be just friends with me because you thought I was… attractive.” Harry ran his hand through his long hair, and tugged on the ends. “And then you said some rather vulgar things that were sort of related to that.”

“No, no, no. It’s different now because we’re both involved with other people.” Louis winked, he was so full of himself. Harry could hardly keep from telling him exactly that, but of course, it was difficult to say anything when Louis kept talking. “You know what, though? I still don’t think we could be friends. Because on some level our significant others would be jealous. It’d cause problems. They’d want to know why we had to be friends with each other, like we weren’t getting enough out of our relationships with them. Chris and I would fight, you and Joe would fight. It would be awful. Nope. I was right the first time. We can’t be friends.”

Harry gripped the strap of his bag and looked Louis square in the face. “Louis.” Harry waited for Louis to focus on him. “Goodbye.” Harry nodded and started walking ahead on the moving sidewalk, leaving Louis behind him. Hopefully for the last time.


	3. 2005

Harry drizzled the oil and vinegar in a spiral onto his chef salad while half-heartedly listening to his best friend and his sister bicker. Thankful that he had the distraction of his lunch and their conversation, so that he didn’t have to think about his own… situation, Harry sipped his club soda and tuned in to their discussion. 

“Liam, it’s ridiculous. You’ve been doing this for two years.” Gemma popped a crouton into her mouth and bit down hard, clearly frustrated. “Two years. You’re thirty years old.” She pointed her fork at Harry and instructed, “You tell him.”

Harry swallowed another sip of club soda. “Sorry, I wasn’t really listening. Though, I assume we’re talking about the fact that,” Harry turned and stared hard at Liam to emphasize, “He’s never going to leave his wife, Liam.”

“I know. I know. Everyone knows.” Liam sighed and propped his elbows on the table, holding his face in his hands and squishing his cheeks. “I was just saying that they bought a new dining room table. That’s all.”

Gemma muttered something under her breath that Harry wasn’t going to bother to ask her to repeat. She waved at the waitress and held her glass up, signalling for another mimosa. “Millions of men in this city and they’re all shit. No one I know can find a decent one.”

Liam snorted. “True, true. Except Harry. Harry’s got the only good one in New York.”

Well, this was it. His opportunity to come clean. After taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, Harry interrupted his sister to say, “Joe and I broke up.” There was a beat of absolute silence, then Liam and Gemma were talking over each other, asking why and when, wondering what happened, making sure that Harry was alright.

“Wednesday. We broke up on Wednesday.” He’d already prepared himself for them to be offended that he hadn't told them immediately, but he’d needed the time alone to think, to rationalize, to come to terms with it.

Gemma lightly squeezed his arm. “Why’d you wait three days to tell us?”

“Just needed to process it, you know?” Harry reached up to feel the short hair on the back of his neck. Maybe he’d grow it long again, he'd cut it short a few months into their relationship because Joe preferred it that way. “I’m fine though. I’m actually glad it’s over now, rather than five years from now. I’m over it.”

There was a rustling sound as Liam dug through his messenger bag, then pulled out his little black book. He actually had a little black book, and Harry marvelled at that fact for a few seconds until Liam started listing names. 

“Well, I’ve got quite a few single men in here.” Liam turned the page. “Oh! You know who’s recently divorced _and_ bisexual?”

“I’m not ready to date, Liam.” Harry shook his head. “Especially not someone who’s just gotten divorced. You realize that most people keep their phone numbers in their cell phones nowadays, little black books are passé.” 

Liam quietly watched Harry for a few seconds, tapping his little black book against his hand. “When I inevitably get pissed off, I’d much rather set this book on fire than my cell phone. But, fine.” He slipped his book back into his messenger bag and continued, “Just don’t wait too long. Anything could happen. The perfect guy could be out there right now, filing divorce papers or moving out of a shared apartment, and if you don’t scoop him up… he could get hit by a bus or something and then where would you be?”

“Hit by a bus? What… I’m not going to date some random guy before I’m ready on the off chance he could die before we meet. That doesn’t even make sense.”

Gemma had watched their entire exchange with an amused expression on her face. “Liam, you’re possibly the strangest man I know and I grew up with Harry.” She sipped her mimosa, set the glass on the table, and leaned forward. “Harry, I’m not going to pressure you to tell me more than you want to right now, but you know you can call me any time of day and I’ll answer. I love you.” She reached over and stroked his arm. “But I’m glad you seem like you’re doing alright with this break-up.”

“Really thought you two would be together forever, Harry.” Liam muttered, his lips against the rim of his glass. He took a gulp of his Bloody Mary and smiled, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

●●●

Liam pulled the door open and held it for Harry, then followed him inside the warmth of the bookstore. “Where do you want to have lunch?”

“Not sure. Let me think about it.” The stacks of books on the display table were messy and out of order, so Harry pulled his gloves off to straighten and organize them while Liam looked through the self-help section. Maybe he’d find a book on recognizing that your married lover is never planning to leave his wife. “Li?”

“Hmm?”

Harry stuffed his gloves and hat into the pockets of his coat, but left his scarf hanging loose around his neck. “Are you still looking for a place to live?”

“Yeah, my roommate is just ridiculous. I think she’s been stealing some of my underwear, but I can’t be sure.” He reached up and pulled down a book from the top shelf and started flipping through. “I should’ve known it was too good to be true, with rent that cheap and no security deposit. At least I’m not on the lease. I can move as soon as I find a place.”

As soon as Harry finished straightening the stacks of books, he stepped closer to Liam. It was a bookstore, not a library, but Harry always felt the need to whisper anyway. “You know that Joe moved out and I kept the apartment? Well, I have an extra room and it would be nice to save on rent. So, if you’re interested…” 

“Yes. Harry, that’ll be great. We’ll have so much fun as roommates.” Liam grabbed Harry’s jaw with one hand, turned his head and planted a wet smacking kiss on Harry’s cheek. “Thank you.”

Using the shoulder of his shirt, Harry wiped his cheek clean. “Thank you, Liam. If anything, it’ll be interesting living together again.”

The book he’d picked up must not have been what he was looking for because Liam hastily placed it back on the shelf. “Listen, so last night I looked at his credit card bill.”

Almost every conversation Harry had with Liam for the last two years involved Harry mentally shaking himself to make sure he wasn’t having some sort of surreal dream where Liam was just a really bad spy. “What if he’d caught you?”

“That’s not the point, Harry.” Liam pinched the bridge of his nose. “He spent two-hundred dollars at Victoria’s Secret for his wife. I don’t think he’s ever going to leave her.”

The urge to roll his eyes was strong, but Harry fought it, though he was pretty sure Liam could detect it in his tone. “Not one person who knows about this affair thinks that he’s ever going to leave her, Liam.”

“You’re right. I know.” Liam nodded slowly. “You’re right.”

Harry hummed. There wasn’t much more he could say. He’d said it all time and time again. Liam would either move on from this affair or he wouldn’t. At least Harry knew he wouldn’t have to deal with awkward interactions in his apartment, since Liam only met the man in hotels. 

“Harry.” Liam whispered urgently. “There’s someone watching you from the Science Fiction section.”

If Harry had any sense at all, he would have walked right out of the store without looking, because he somehow knew who would be standing there when he furtively glanced over. Of course, it was Louis Tomlinson standing beside the tall display, most of his body hidden by the shelf, his face half-covered by the book that he was obviously pretending to read. 

Harry whispered out of the side of his mouth as he looked down at the table in front of him, “I know him, we drove to New York together after college. He’s a real piece of work. Total ass, if you want to know the truth.”

“He’s cute.” Liam tipped his head down and talked to the table full of books. “What’s his name?”

“Are you serious, Li? I just said he’s an ass.” Harry huffed and turned his body so that he could look Liam in the eye while avoiding Louis. “His name is Louis Tomlinson. And it doesn’t matter if you think he’s cute; he’s probably married by now.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I got stuck next to him on a plane a few years ago, right after I started dating Joe, actually.” Harry picked up a book at random and flipped through it. “He told me he and his boyfriend were going to Vermont for a civil union ceremony, so they probably got married in Massachusetts as soon as they were able to.”

“He’s still watching you. Do you think he’ll come over?”

“No, he never remembers me.” Harry looked up and dropped the book to the tabletop because Louis was slowly approaching, recognition dawning on his face as he got closer.

His hair wasn’t done up in the same style it had been in on the plane, it was soft and brushed to the side. A short beard covered his face, but it was quite a different look from the uneven scruff he’d had when they’d driven to New York. The eyes were the same though, clear, bright and blue, framed by unfairly long eyelashes, with slightly more crinkles around the outside when he smiled. Harry only had a split second to wonder how he knew enough about Louis’ eyes to recognize the change before Louis was sticking his hand out and saying, “Harry Styles, right?”

“That’s me. And you’re Louis Tomlinson. This is my friend Liam Payne.” Harry turned to introduce Liam, but Liam was busy staring at his phone screen, texting furiously.

Without looking up, Liam said, “Nice to meet you.” And continued texting while Harry and Louis watched him for a few seconds. Liam finally raised his head and smiled sheepishly. “Something’s come up. I’ll have to take a raincheck on lunch, Harry.” Quickly, Liam shook hands with Louis and dashed out of the bookstore, leaving Louis obviously confused, and Harry more than a little annoyed. That was the third time in two weeks that Liam had ditched him to meet his lover for a quickie during lunch.

The ceiling of the bookshop was interesting to look at; it was papered with pages torn from old books, hopefully paperbacks that had seen better days. Harry stared at it for a moment with the hope that when he finally looked down, Louis would have disappeared. No such luck. 

“How’ve you been, Harry?” This version of Louis was more soft-spoken than the one in the car on the way to New York, or the one on the plane five years ago. He wasn’t in a suit this time, nor was he dressed like he’d been on the drive to New York. It was like a happy medium—under his heavy black coat, he wore a red Adidas hoodie and faded jeans, but he still had converse on his feet. Though they were clean this time.

There had to be a way out of this conversation. Harry could play nice for a few minutes, then make an excuse, and leave. “Fine. I’m fine.” He forced a smile onto his face, but he knew his dimple was barely showing. Maybe, if Harry didn’t ask any questions in return, Louis would get the hint.

“How’s Joe?” Louis smiled and hooked his thumbs in the front pockets of his jeans. 

There it was. Oddly, in the few weeks that had passed since they’d broken up, Harry hadn’t been confronted with too many awkward conversations. Any mutual friends they’d had had really been Joe’s friends, and Harry had never been one to discuss his personal life at work, so it hadn’t come up. The times that it had come up had felt strangely appropriate. An elderly lady who lived in the building asked about Joe when Harry helped her carry her shopping bags up to her apartment, and the checkout girl at their corner bodega had handed Harry the usual pack of Joe’s brand of cigarettes when he’d bought a six-pack of beer on the previous Friday evening, leading to a conversation about how hard it was to quit smoking, the checkout girl’s grandfather who’d died of lung cancer, and finally about their break-up. 

Harry answered in his most diplomatic voice. “He’s fine.” It was actually difficult to keep up the fake smile, so Harry surrendered and let it drop from his face as he continued, “At least, that’s what I’ve heard.”

Louis’ eyebrows shot up and he leaned over to whisper as if they were sharing secrets, “Are you guys not together anymore?”

“Nope. Just broke up a few weeks ago, actually.” Harry slowly exhaled and puffed out his cheeks, prepared for the inevitable comment from Louis, this had to be the thing that would bring out his usual dickish behavior.

Instead, Louis chewed on his cheek and let out a low whistle. “That sucks. I’m really sorry, Harry.”

Shocked that apparently there were topics that weren’t up for ridicule, Harry continued their conversation against his better judgement. “So, how about you? How was the ceremony in Vermont? Did you guys go up to Massachusetts to get married when they legalized it?”

A short laugh shot out of Louis, though he was clearly not happy when he spoke. “Yeah, um, we were going to, actually. We had planned to go this summer, but… instead, we broke up.”

“Oh, no.” Harry was legitimately shocked at that. Their conversation had taken a completely different turn than Harry had anticipated. The last thing he expected was to feel sympathy for Louis. “Hey, I’m really sorry.”

Louis tilted his head and shrugged one shoulder. “It is what it is, you know? So, um, what happened with you guys?”

“I… I don’t want to talk about it here.” Harry pointed to the woman standing nearby, who was clearly eavesdropping. “My lunch date ditched me, so if you’re hungry, we could get something to eat.”

A small smile crept across Louis’ face and he nodded. They made their way to the cash register and Louis waited while Harry purchased a copy of _Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince_ , then they walked to a nearby cafe where they spent the rest of the afternoon drinking wine and talking about their respective exes. 

“When Joe and I met, we both wanted the same thing, you know?” Harry reached over to refill Louis’ glass of wine and topped off his own. “We wanted to be together, but we were in no rush to live together, and then, later on we wanted to live together, but neither of us wanted to have kids. It was… all of our friends with kids, whenever we’d have them over or we’d manage to get them to go out, they’d talk about how they never had sex anymore, how having kids just sucked the desire right out of them.” As he talked, Harry ran his finger around the rim of his glass. “They complained about babysitters and diapers and preschools and never being able to go on vacation and Joe and I would listen, right? We were sympathetic. But as soon as we were alone, well…” Harry smiled a little, sad, half-smile. “We’d fuck like crazy, but then afterward, we’d say how lucky we were to have found each other. How great it was that we could fuck on the couch or the kitchen floor without worrying about being interrupted. We could fly off to Europe at a moment’s notice.” 

Louis was quiet, as if he could tell that Harry wasn’t finished, or like he knew Harry needed a moment to gather his thoughts. He sat there watching Harry, his elbows propped up on the table, both hands cradling his wine glass. Harry picked up his glass of wine and swirled it around before taking a sip. “My cousin was in town with her husband and their daughter Rose, and I’d promised to take Rose to F.A.O. Schwartz; kids love that place. So we’d gone and I’d bought her this ridiculously large teddy bear, we’d had lunch and ice cream, and were in a cab on our way back to their hotel. And like, all day she’d been pointing out everything that she saw, right? She saw a truck, she said _truck_. She saw a cop, she said _policeman._ It was cute.” Harry smiled and paused for another sip of wine. “We were stopped in traffic and there was a man standing on the sidewalk waiting to cross, he had a little girl on his shoulders, and a woman was standing next to him pushing a stroller with a tiny, little baby inside. Rose turns to me with this huge smile on her face, points out the window and says _family._ And I just… started to cry.”

“Oh, Harry.” Louis reached across the table as if to pat Harry’s hand, but drew back almost immediately. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah.” Harry sat back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling. “So I went home and talked to Joe. We talked for hours that day. Then again the next day. And it came down to me, because I’d realized that we never actually flew off to Europe at a moment’s notice, and we never fucked anywhere but our bed.” Harry combed his fingers through his hair. Yeah, he was going to grow it long again, he missed his curls. “Anyway, I said _this is what I want,_ and he said he didn’t want the same thing, and so he moved out.”

“And that was it. Wow.” Louis tapped his finger against his chin. “I’m really sorry, Harry.”

“I’m not.” Harry straightened up in his chair and raised his chin slightly. He’d spent a lot of time thinking about this, and he knew it was for the best. “The more I think about it, the better I feel about the whole thing. He couldn’t give me what I wanted and, instead of sticking it out for a few more years, we ended it. Clean break, you know?”

“That’s… actually a really healthy way of looking at it. Good for you.” Louis sat back in his chair and looked down at his lap. “I suppose it’s my turn then.”

Harry nodded. Fair’s fair, after all.

“We were together almost eight years, living together for seven. Had that civil union ceremony in Vermont five years ago. We’d planned to go to Massachusetts as soon as we heard about them legalizing gay marriage.” Louis leaned forward and propped his chin up on his elbow. “We’d been planning it for a while, just sort of unofficially. Talked to my parents, his parents, or at least I thought he had, maybe he didn’t, I don’t know.” He seemed lost in thought for a bit, quietly looking off into the distance, but then he started talking again. “I’d asked my friend Niall to be my best man. And then I come home from work one day at the start of the new year and Chris says _I don’t think I want to get married._ But the way he said it, it sounded like he had a problem with the idea of marriage in general. Like he didn’t like the institution. So I thought, well, alright. We hadn’t paid for anything or planned anything concrete, it had all been just talk up to that point anyway.” Louis tapped his fingers against the base of his wine glass, then picked it up and took a sip. “So I said, you know, it was fine and we could take some time to think about it, but then the next day he says he doesn’t want to think about it anymore, and he wants to move out, but that we can go on dates and stuff.”

“What?” Harry had never heard of anyone doing anything like that. It made no sense.

“Yeah, and I said no. I said that the reason we’d been living together for seven years, had that damn civil ceremony, planned to get fucking married, was because I didn’t want to date anymore. I mean, that’s the whole point of commitment, isn’t it? Sure, you can go on dates with your significant other or whatever, but you’re together. There’s no… you can’t go backwards. And that’s what I told him. I said we couldn’t go backwards.” Louis tipped his wine glass back and swallowed what was left. “So I’m standing there telling him that, and I say something about how we love each other. And suddenly it hits me that maybe he doesn’t. I asked him and he said _I don’t know if I’ve ever truly loved you.”_

Harry gasped and clapped his hand over his mouth. He thought he’d had it bad with Joe, but that was nothing compared to this.

With a wave of his hand, Louis continued. “Literally five minutes later there’s someone buzzing to come up and I let them in and it’s a moving company. Turns out, he’d hired these movers a couple of weeks before.”

This was fascinating, like watching a train wreck. Harry couldn’t look away. “No way.” Harry leaned forward, his arms crossed on the table, waiting for the next twist in the story. 

“Way.” Louis nodded. “So I asked him why he waited all this time to tell me, and he says he didn’t want to ruin my birthday and then Christmas and New Year’s. He kissed me at midnight on New Year’s Eve knowing that he was leaving me.”

There was no other word for it, Harry was shocked. His mouth hung open and he couldn’t think of a thing to say. 

They sat there quietly for a minute, and Harry thought about asking for the check so they could leave, but then Louis broke the silence. “It was all a load of bullshit anyway. He’d been having an affair. I followed him one day after he left the hospital where he works.” Louis banged his head on the table and left it there, his hands curled in fists on either side. He muttered into the tablecloth, “I went and got tested immediately. Still waiting to get my results back. He swears he used protection and we’d actually been using condoms, god, for the last six months or so because he said it was too messy otherwise. The mess hadn’t bothered him for six years before that. Shit. I feel so stupid, I should’ve known—”

“No.” Harry couldn’t stop himself, he reached across and laid his hand on top of Louis’ fist and squeezed. “Don’t blame yourself for what that asshole did.” Louis sat back up and stared at Harry. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“He is though. You’re one hundred percent correct about that, Harry.” Louis waved at the waitress and signaled for the check. “You want to go walk around?”

As he reached into his pocket to get his wallet, Harry nodded. “Yeah, it’s not too cold out.” Though the topic was depressing, the conversation was surprisingly not, and Harry really did appreciate the opportunity to talk about his break-up with someone who was in a similar situation. That that someone was Louis Tomlinson made it strange, for sure, but somehow Harry felt like he could be more free with his feelings about Joe when he was talking to Louis. Probably because he wasn’t likely to ever see him again. He divided their check and figured the tip, then counted out his money, too distracted to notice Louis watching him and smiling.

“You did that ten years ago at that diner.” Louis pointed at Harry’s stack of coins. “I remember.”

Harry squinted at him and asked, “Are you going to give me shit about it?”

“Probably.”

Harry snorted, he was a little drunk. “Alright. At least you’re up front about it.” 

He stood up and slid his wallet back into his pocket, and bundled himself up in his coat, hat, scarf and gloves. Then he watched Louis toss two twenties onto the table, put on his coat, and pull the hood of his sweatshirt over his head, tying the strings together in a bow. When they walked outside, Louis shoved his hands in his pockets.

“It’s colder than I thought.” Louis shivered and pulled his hood tighter around his face. “Niall keeps telling me I’m lucky because I got to keep the apartment.”

“Yeah, people have been telling me that too.” Harry pulled his hat down to cover his ears and looked over at Louis. “I thought that was such a strange way to look at it, I mean, yeah, looking for a new place would suck, but it’s going to suck so much more to start dating again. I haven’t dated anyone in more than five years.”

“I think Niall just wanted to move in with me. His apartment is shit and his bedroom is a closet.” 

Harry chuckled. He’d seen so many ridiculously small apartments when he’d first moved to the city. “Liam, the guy who abandoned me at the bookstore, he’s moving in with me. My apartment is nice and all, but I… I’m used to living with someone now.”

Louis hummed and they walked quietly side by side for a few minutes. “You know, ten years ago when we met, I didn’t like you at all.” 

“I didn’t like you either.” Harry didn’t want to think about their drive up from college. And the last time on the plane. Harry had been so angry afterwards that he had too much to drink and went to his conference the following morning with a hangover. 

“Sure you did. You were just so… I don’t know. Uptight, I guess. You’re much cooler now.”

“No, no, no.” Harry stopped and turned to face Louis, pointing at him and fighting the urge to poke him in the chest. “That’s such a backhanded compliment. I’m not any cooler now than I was then. I just didn’t want to sleep with you and you saw that as a character flaw; you didn’t even entertain the possibility that the problem could have been with you, and because of that, you wrote off the entire option of being friends with me.”

The entire time Harry was pointing at him, Louis was looking down, watching Harry’s finger, and smiling. When Harry finished speaking, he moved his hands to his hips and stood there, letting the resentment bubble up; apparently he’d held onto it and it had laid dormant for ten years. The afternoon had been a mistake. Harry was about to make his excuses and go, but Louis looked up at him, still smiling and tilted his head.

“Is ten years too long to wait for an apology?”

“I…” Harry grinned, taken aback. “I guess not.”

“Well, then, I apologize. I was… kind of obnoxious back then.”

“Apology accepted.” 

“It’s fucking freezing.” They stood there, turned towards each other, their breath making clouds in front of their faces. “I’m gonna catch a cab and go home, but, um, do you want to have dinner sometime?”

Harry’s mouth dropped open. 

Louis laughed. “As friends. I’m not asking you out, Harry.”

“Friends, then? That’s a possibility with you now?”

Louis moved over to the side of the road to flag down a taxi. “Yeah, I think so. We’ve had an alright time today. Commiserating about our break-ups and all. We even had lunch together and we drank wine together and I never once thought about having sex with you.”

Harry leaned his head back and laughed into the sky. “Alright. Friends.” Harry dug through his pocket for one of his business cards to give to Louis, then he stuck out his hand to shake, but Louis pulled him in for a quick hug before stepping away to open the door of the taxi.

“Did you want to share the cab?” 

“Nah, thanks though.” Harry held up his bag from the bookstore. “I’m going to go sit in that bakery over there, eat a slice of cake, and read my book.” He pointed at the card in Louis’ hand and said, “It’s up to you if we’re friends now. I don’t have your number.” Then he waved and turned to walk in the direction of the bakery.

●●●

It didn’t take long for Louis to call, in fact, when Harry got home that evening, still slightly tipsy from the wine they’d had at lunch and his belly full of chocolate cake, there was a message on his answering machine from Louis. While he put his box of almond croissants in the fridge and removed all of the layers of clothing he had on, Harry listened to Louis’ recorded ramble and laughed. 

“Harry, it’s me. Louis. I wanted to call you right away because we’re friends, we’re not dating, so there are no rules about waiting three days or whatever. Also, I’m a little bit drunk. I didn’t realize it before, I think because I was so fucking cold that the shivering kept me from feeling it, but as soon as I sat in that cab, I was like whoa. Anyway, Niall is moving in with me next weekend, and I’m helping him on Friday, but I don’t want to hang around Saturday and help him unpack. So what I’m calling for, shit I just remembered that I’m talking to the machine. You’re not listening to me right now. You can’t answer. Do you wanna hang out or something next Saturday? Call me. Bye.”

Harry was hanging up his coat when the message ended with a loud beep. Thinking he’d missed something, Harry started to push replay on Louis’ message, but before he could, a second message started. It was Louis again, apologizing for drunkenly having a conversation with Harry’s answering machine; he left his number the second time. Harry laughed all the way to his bedroom where he finished taking off his clothes and changed into his flannel pajamas and fuzzy slippers.

●●●

“Liam.” Harry interrupted him before he could get going on his rant about his married boyfriend. “Liam, listen to me. He’s never going to leave his wife. But, if he ever did leave her, I’d love to meet him, okay?”

Liam sat on the couch, cradling his face in his hands. “Yeah, okay. I know you’re right.” He stood up and shoved his hands in the front pockets of his jeans. “I’m going to go finish unpacking. Then I’ve got to go buy some new underwear. I swear she took every last pair before I left yesterday.” He stopped by the refrigerator to grab a beer to take to his bedroom.

Harry wrinkled his face in disgust. “I’m glad you got out of there. Happy to have you here, man.” He bent over to zip up his boots, then grabbed his things to head out to meet Louis.

“Are you leaving me?” Liam pouted, then tipped back his beer.

“Yeah, I told you, I’m meeting Louis. His roommate’s taken over the apartment for the day, so we’re hanging out.” Harry backed out of the door with a wave.

●●●

“What are we doing? Eating? Drinking? Walking? Sitting? Are we meeting some of those old men who play chess in the park?” Louis asked, his words coming one after the other as if he felt no need to breathe.

Harry frowned. “I don’t know. You asked me to meet you here. I thought you had plans.” He looked around at the shops that were nearby.

“Nah, I walked down here from my place. Had a coffee and called you when I realized I didn’t know where you lived, so I couldn’t walk there.”

Harry huffed a little laugh. “Let’s go in there.” He pointed to a small cafe with a display full of croissants and muffins. “We can take it to go and walk to the park.”

“Yeah, okay.” Louis followed Harry inside the warmth of the cafe. “I’m glad it’s not so cold today. I thought I was going to freeze walking around with you last time.”

Harry looked at him. He was wearing the same coat over a different hoodie, gray this time, with the same faded jeans and black converse. “And yet you’re wearing basically the same thing. You should bundle up more when it’s cold.”

“I like to live dangerously. It’s my dark side.”

“Oh, right, I forgot about your dark side.” Harry chuckled and ordered his croissant and coffee, then stood to the side and waited while Louis placed his order. When they were back out on the sidewalk, Harry asked, “Still planning on dying alone surrounded by cats? Isn’t that what you said?”

“What? No.” Louis looked at him askance. “What?”

“When we were coming up here from college, you said something about your dark side and how you thought about death, and that you figured you’d die alone surrounded by cats or something.”

Louis wrinkled his brow and chewed on the corner of his bottom lip for a few seconds. “Yeah, I probably said that. I was such an idiot back then.” He shook his head. “No, I don’t plan to die alone, surrounded by cats, but,” he grinned and took a bite of croissant, finishing his thought around a mouthful of food, “anything can happen.”

They spent the morning walking around the city, they never made it to the park, popping in and out of shops whenever one of them saw something interesting in a window display. It was the most fun Harry had had in a while and thinking about that made him stop and sigh. Of course, Louis heard it, and of course, he asked what was bothering Harry.

When Harry told him he was bothered because they were having fun, Louis asked, “Have you been sleeping?”

“Why?”

“Because I haven’t.” Louis followed Harry through the door of a thrift shop. “I really miss Chris. I don’t know, maybe I’m coming down with something. I’m up at four o’clock in the morning watching infomercials every night.” He poked at a display of velvet hats, picked one up and dropped it on Harry’s head. “I’ve bought almost everything they’ve advertised, including a Wonder Mop and a set of Tae Bo DVDs. I’m never gonna do that shit.” Harry, who was still wearing the purple velvet hat, laughed at Louis, then twirled around in long, shimmering gold lamé. Louis stared at him. “What is that?”

“I don’t know. I think it’s sort of like a shawl that you’d wear over a dress. It’s sparkly, I like it.”

Louis shrugged. “You should get it then.”

Harry laughed. “No, I couldn’t.”

“Why?”

Harry didn’t know. He’d been with Joe for so long, and he’d sort of grown with him. There were things that Harry liked to do—like trying on silly clothes in thrift shops—that Joe never had time for. It was like his hair: when they’d met, Harry’s hair had been past his shoulders and he’d loved it. It had taken years to grow out, but he’d cut it because Joe said it didn’t look professional. 

He’d already decided to grow it out again. 

Harry rubbed his jaw and thought for a second. “I’m not going to get this, just because I don’t know what I’d wear it with.” He shrugged it off his shoulders and hung it back up. “But I’m buying this hat. It suits me, I think.”

“It does.” Louis smiled. “I like it. And you’ll have to tell everyone that I picked it out.”

●●● 

Within weeks, Louis and Harry were talking almost every day. Sometimes they met up for lunch or shopping or just walking around, sometimes they spent hours on the phone together, complaining about work or their exes, lamenting the dating world which neither of them had stepped back into. Who knew that a friendship could be based on mutual suffering?

The microwave dinged and Harry pulled out a big bowl to dump his popcorn into. He’d already opened a bottle of wine and had his TV turned to the right channel. Thirty minutes in, as he sat on his couch tossing popcorn into his mouth, the phone rang.

Louis didn’t wait for Harry to say hello, as soon as the phone was close to his ear, Harry could hear him asking, “What are you doing?”

“Watching _Casablanca._ It's on T.V.”

“Really? What channel?”

“Eleven.”

“I can’t believe you said you’d rather leave on the plane with Victor Laszlo than stay in Casablanca with Humphrey Bogart.”

“What? I never said that.” 

“Yes, you did. On the drive here from college. You were adamant about it. It was one of the reasons I didn’t like you.”

“I never said that.”

“Okay, you’re right. I must have imagined that conversation.”

Harry shushed him. “Watch the movie.”

“Oh, Ingrid Bergman. I love her. She seems totally low-maintenance. Did you know Isabella Rossellini is her daughter?”

Harry started to sing “Blue Velvet” over Louis as he talked about Ingrid Bergman’s acting career. Apparently, he was a big fan. “Wait. What do you mean low-maintenance?”

“There are two types of people. Low-maintenance and high-maintenance.”

“Which one am I?”

Louis chuckled. “You’re the worst kind. You’re high-maintenance, but you think you’re low-maintenance.”

“High-maintenance? How’s that?”

“How’s that?” Louis cleared his throat and began to speak in a lower, slower voice. “Waiter, I’ll have the chef salad, but I don’t want the dressing that comes with it, I’ll have the oil and vinegar on the side. For my meal, I’d like the sesame tuna, seared rare, not medium-rare, with the sesame sauce on the side. And a glass of water with lemon, but the lemon on the side, not in the glass. On the side is a big thing with you.”

Harry hummed. “Well, I just like things the way I like them.”

“I know,” Louis agreed. “High-maintenance.” 

Harry rolled his eyes and shrugged, even though Louis couldn’t see him. 

When the movie ended, Harry moved to his bedroom, talking to Louis as he brushed his teeth and washed his face, pressing mute while he peed, and still listening to him ramble as he climbed into bed. The pillows sank beneath his head when he settled back with a yawn. Harry sighed and said, “You know, last night I went to bed at seven thirty. I haven’t done that since elementary school.”

Harry could hear Louis peeing, he never bothered to press mute, and his voice echoed off the tiles in his bathroom. “That’s one good thing about depression, at least you get some sleep.”

“I’m not depressed.” Harry thought back over the past few weeks, as he wandered from desk to desk around the office, turning in assignments that he didn’t even remember doing, forgetting to eat until his stomach gnawed at itself, dropping in on a spin class that he’d always loved before, but wasn’t able to keep up with now… Maybe he was depressed.

“Okay, then you’re not.” Louis readily agreed. “I think I am though. Do you still sleep on your side of the bed?”

Harry rocked his head from side to side, taking in his surroundings. “Nope. I’m sprawled across the middle of my bed right now. I did for the first week or so though.”

“You’re better at this than I am. This break-up thing.” Harry could hear Louis shuffling around, maybe he was climbing into bed. “I stick to my side. Feels weird if my leg crosses over.”

“You’ll get used to it.”

“Yeah, maybe. Maybe I’ll just buy a smaller bed.” Louis hummed, then laughed quietly. “Maybe I’ll buy bunkbeds, then we can have sleepovers.”

Harry rolled his eyes, but he smiled. “You should know that I’m rolling my eyes at you. Think you’ll be able to sleep tonight?”

Louis grunted.

“What was that? Was that a word?”

He grunted again. “No. I was grunting. I think I might start moaning. That’s what I’ll do if I can’t sleep.” Louis moaned, low and long and Harry rolled his eyes again.

“Good night, Lou.” Harry yawned around his words and Louis moaned in response, so Harry hung up on him. He lay there in the lamplight, staring at his phone, studiously ignoring the strange swirling in his stomach that had started up with Louis’ moaning. He reached up and turned off his lamp, hoping that sleep would come quickly.

●●●

Every envelope had a stamp, the correct name and address, and the correct return address. Even though he knew that, and had double checked it before he left the house, Harry stood next to the mailbox on the corner, at least a dozen envelopes in his hand, carefully sliding them inside, one by one, and peeking in to make sure they’d dropped down before he’d put another one in. Open, slide, close, open, peek, close, and repeat for each envelope.

Louis stood by patiently, or at least Harry had assumed he was standing patiently, until Louis snatched the remaining envelopes from Harry’s hand and unceremoniously stuffed them all into the mailbox at once, letting the door slam after he dropped them inside.

“Okay, then. Are you in a hurry?” Harry asked as he opened the mailbox door and peeked inside to be sure his mail had all made it safely to the bottom.

Louis shrugged, his hands were stuffed into the front pockets of his jeans. “Not particularly. Just bored of standing here.”

“Let’s go then.” Harry shook his hair out of his eyes and when it didn’t move, he combed it back with his fingers. It was starting to get long. “I guess I need to make an appointment to get a haircut.”

“Why?” Louis bumped his elbow into Harry’s arm. “Is it bothering you? I thought you were growing it out.”

Harry’s eyes crossed as he twirled one finger around a curl in the middle of his forehead, tugged it down, then let it bounce back up. “I was… I am. I don’t know. It does bother me sometimes. It’s at this in between stage and I know when it gets longer, I’ll like it, but right now it kind of annoys me.”

“Because it’s in your face? Just pull it back in something. Like a headband or a hat or whatever.” Louis opened the door to their usual lunch place and held it for Harry, while he continued tugging at his curls.

●●●

Harry’s favorite thrift store had an entire rack dedicated to nothing but hats and scarves. He’d bought Louis a warm winter hat and two heavy knit scarfs for a grand total of seven dollars a few weeks back. The mirror beside the rack was old and spotty and for sale for a ridiculous amount of money, but it was clear enough for Harry to see himself, as well as the three hats that Louis had stacked on top of his head.

“You’re really annoying, you know.” Harry pulled off the top two hats and turned to the side to see how the dark brown fedora looked from that angle. “I like this. Do you like it?”

Louis grabbed it off of Harry’s head and plopped it on his own, elbowing Harry out of the way so that he could see himself in the mirror. “I mean, I don’t know.” He turned from side to side. “I don’t think it’s for me.” He took the hat off and dropped it back onto Harry’s head. “I think it works on you though, but it’s your head. What do you care if I like it?” 

“Thanks, Lou.” Harry placed the hat in his shopping basket and dug through the selection of scarves. “None of these are warm enough.” He pulled out a long, thin, green scarf and held it up to let the light shine through. “It’s so thin. It’s really nice though. Feel it.” Harry held it out for Louis to touch.

“It’s nice.” Louis ran his fingers down the length of fabric. “Oh, hey, I’ve got an idea. Kneel down on the floor.”

“Very funny.”

“No, I’m serious.” Louis looked around, then pulled a short table over in front of the mirror. “Sit on this instead, face the mirror.”

Harry cautiously sat on the edge of the table, wondering what in the hell Louis was up to. It could be anything, he just hoped it didn’t involve Louis loudly embarrassing him in his favorite shop. Louis was quiet though, as he ran the green fabric through his hands, and draped it over Harry’s shoulders. Harry remained still and waited patiently, watching Louis’ reflection in the mirror while he gathered the scarf together and looped it around Harry’s head, tucking his hair back, and winding the fabric around until the two ends met at the base of Harry’s neck. Louis tied it there and fussed for a second with a few of Harry’s curls, then dropped his hands to Harry’s shoulders and said, “There. Well, that’s an option if you don’t want to wear a hat. What do you think?”

The dimples in Harry’s cheeks said enough, he thought, but he added some words for Louis’ benefit. “I love it.” He turned his head to get a look at the knot in the back. “I don’t know if I can tie it myself like this, you’ll have to show me. But I really like it, Lou. Thank you.” Harry stood up and turned around to hug Louis across the small table he’d been sitting on. “I’m going to buy, like, a dozen scarves now.” Harry turned back to the rack and began pulling scarves off, running his fingers along the fabric, oohing and ahhing over the colors and prints, and dropping them into his shopping basket. 

They barely made it to their usual cafe before they stopped serving lunch. Harry almost missed out on his regular chef salad. 

●●●

“I’m so glad it’s finally tolerable outside without a coat.” Harry reached up to adjust his headscarf, pulling it down a bit in the back. “I still don’t do this as well as you do. You’ll have to show me your secrets, Lou.”

“Never.” Louis stopped him, gently laid a hand on his shoulder, and turned him around. Harry bent his knees so that Louis could more easily adjust his scarf. “If I teach you my ways, then you’ll have no use for me. Then where would I be?” He finished retying the knot and pulled one of Harry’s curls, their signal that he was done, so Harry straightened back up and they continued their walk around the park. 

“Oh, I had that dream again. You know the one. I’m fucking this guy, right? Only it’s like I’m competing in the Olympics. The Japanese judge gives me a 9.7, the English judge gives me a 9.8, and my mom is disguised as the judge for the U.S.A. and she gives me a 5.6. I don’t know why. Must have been the dismount.” Louis snickered at Harry’s confused expression. “You know I’m kidding. My mom wasn’t there.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “I think my eye muscles get a workout just being around you.”

“What about you? You have any recurring sex dreams?”

Harry peered over at Louis, but he wasn’t looking back at him. He was watching an old man feed pigeons. “I guess. I mean, it’s the same one I’ve been having since I was twelve.”

“That’s a lot of years to keep having the same dream. Must be a good one.”

“Not really. It’s just… It’s kind of boring actually. But when I’m having the dream, it’s hot, so I don’t… I’ve never told anyone.”

“Come on, Harry. I told you mine.”

“Ugh. Fine. Okay, well, it’s just basically this guy, this faceless man, though he’s got a super hot body, and he just rips off my clothes. Tears the fabric, buttons go flying everywhere.”

“And?”

“And nothing. That’s it.” Harry stopped and Louis stopped to turn around and face him. “Well, I guess that’s not completely true. Sometimes it’s different.”

“Yeah, like how?”

“Sometimes I’m wearing different clothes.”

●●●

The sun was warm on his face and Harry was lying spread eagle across a blanket in the grass, arms stretched as wide as he could get them, sunglasses covering his eyes. Even through the fabric of the blanket, Harry could feel the pricking of the grass against the skin of his back. He was shirtless and sweaty and out of breath and thirsty, but he’d already finished his bottle of water and refilling it at the water fountain would require that he get up and walk and that was just not going to happen. 

It was incredibly hot, peak of summer hot, how did people live before air conditioning hot, and they’d been kicking a soccer ball around for over an hour in the middle of the day, like they didn't know any better, even though they definitely did. And Harry distinctly remembered saying something to that effect before Louis convinced him to play _for just a few minutes._

He’d been wondering whether or not to put his shirt back on, even though it was damp with sweat, because he forgot sunscreen, or rather, he didn’t realize he’d be shirtless in the park when he agreed to meet up with Louis. While he’d let his mind drift from contemplating moving versus lying there and shriveling up from dehydration, Louis had wandered off in search of… something. Harry wasn’t sure. Louis had just said he’d be right back and had run off, leaving Harry with their stuff.

A shadow crept over his face, so Harry cracked open one eyelid, but opened his eyes fully and relaxed the wrinkle between his eyebrows when he saw that it was Louis. And not just Louis, but Louis with a snow cone dripping over each hand. Harry pushed himself up to sitting and scooted to the corner of the blanket to make room for Louis, who handed over a rainbow striped snow cone, sat down and pulled two bottles of water from the pockets of his shorts. 

Harry bit down on his snow cone, hurting his teeth in the process, but he didn’t care because it was so cold, and he kind of wanted to rub it all over his body. “You were gone forever. I thought I was going to die.”

Louis, the king of non sequiturs, said, “I think I want to learn to speak French.” 

Over a mouth full of snow cone, Harry asked, “Why? I mean, that’s cool, but what brought this on?” 

The grin that appeared on Louis’ face meant he was about to do or say something absurd. He responded in a ridiculous, fake French accent, _“Because I’m wasting this accent speaking English.”_

Harry choked on his snow cone. He should have known better than to ask.

_“Come on, repeat after me.”_ Louis continued in his horrible accent. _“French is a sexy language.”_

“French is a sexy language,” Harry deadpanned. “You know, to be fair, I have a friend from France and she says that French is the least sexy of the languages.”

_“No, repeat like this. French is a sexy language.”_

Harry rolled his eyes, but as usual, he did what Louis asked him to do. _“French is a sexy language.”_

_“If I learn to speak French, I’ll get laid.”_

Harry held back a laugh and repeated, _“If I learn to speak French, I’ll get laid.”_

_“Snow cones are syrupy and sexy.”_ Louis winked and licked the top of his blue snow cone in an over the top faux provocative way.

This time Harry couldn’t stop the laugh before he said, _“Snow cones are syrupy and sexy.”_

_“Would you like to go to the movies tonight?”_

Harry dutifully repeated, _“Would you like to go to the movies tonight?”_

Louis shook his head. _“No, do not repeat. Answer. Would you like to go to the movies tonight?”_ He dropped the accent to add, “Batman Begins is still in the theater.”

“Oh.” Harry chewed on the side of his lip and looked away. “I can’t.”

_“Why? You have a hot date tonight?”_ Louis exaggerated his horrible accent.

Harry nodded. “I mean, I don't know if it’s hot, but it’s something.” 

Louis sat up and tucked his knees underneath him. “That’s great, Harry. Why didn’t you tell me?”

Harry finished his snow cone and crumpled up the paper, then dropped back down to lie flat on the blanket again. “I don’t know. We’ve been spending so much time together…”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m happy for you. It’s good that you’re getting back out there.” Louis poked him in the stomach and Harry rolled onto his side to get away.

After rearranging himself on the blanket and drinking about half of his water bottle in one go, Harry suggested, “You should try it too, Lou.”

“I’m not ready.” Louis dismissed him with a shake of his head. 

But Harry wouldn’t let it go. “It’s time, Louis. One date.”

Louis ignored him, but Harry was sure he’d do it. He knew Louis had turned down quite a few dates over the last few months. 

“You know, remember those sheer shirts you were trying on when we went shopping a few weeks ago? You should wear one on your date. And those tight jeans that you secretly wanted to buy, but didn’t because you thought I’d make fun of you.”

“How’d you know about the jeans?” Harry laughed. He’d thought he’d hidden how much he liked them. 

Louis shrugged. “I know you. Plus, they looked good.”

“You think?”

Louis nodded and shook the last few drops of his water bottle in Harry’s face before lying back on the blanket and closing his eyes.

●●●

“Have you guys really been living with one chair and the TV on the floor?” Harry huffed as he struggled with his end of the giant area rug they were putting down in Louis’ living room. “I still can’t believe he left you the apartment, but took all the furniture.”

Louis laughed, so Harry stared at him until he explained. “I farted on every single piece of furniture that he took, then I jacked off on the couch, like _on the couch,_ and turned the cushions over so he wouldn’t notice until later. It was off-white upholstery.”

Harry slapped his knee and fell down on the floor to laugh since there wasn’t anything else to sit on. “You’re so disgusting. I can’t believe you did that.”

“Of course I did that. Fuck him.” They rolled out the rug and both sprawled out on it. “I can’t believe you talked me into going on that date. It was awful, Harry. The most uncomfortable night of my life.”

The thick, soft pile of the new rug tickled the backs of Harry’s arms where they moved across it when he tried to do a carpet angel. “I think that the first date back is the hardest, Lou.” 

Louis snorted and threw some of the plastic wrapping from the rug at Harry’s face. “You’ve only had one date. You don’t know. It could get worse.”

“It can’t get much worse than the guy who unwrapped my headscarf and tried to do a bellydance in the middle of the restaurant.” It had been… difficult from the moment they met in front of the restaurant and had gotten increasingly uncomfortable as the meal wore on. The guy had seemed nice when Harry met him at the library of all places, but he was dull and _only_ wanted to talk about books. He seemed very judgmental when Harry said that the last book he’d read was _Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince_ , and Harry didn’t want anything to do with a man who disapproved of his favorite book series.

Louis sat up and said, “That sounds like an absolute dream compared to mine, Harry. It was fine at first, we had dinner, it was nice enough. I made some jokes and he laughed, maybe it was a little forced, but he laughed. We finished a bottle of wine and ordered dessert and were talking about our jobs, and that led to talk of our degrees, and college. And he says he went to Michigan State and this reminds me of Chris. All of the sudden, I’m in the middle of this massive anxiety attack and I had to leave the restaurant.” Louis flopped back down onto the rug. “It was awful.”

Harry opened his eyes and looked over at Louis to ask, “Christopher went to Michigan State?”

“No, he went to Northwestern, but they're both Big Ten schools.”

Harry pretended that what Louis had said made any sense at all and closed his eyes again. They stayed like that, lying in the quiet on the new rug, smelling the weird odor that came with it, for a few minutes. Harry sighed and said, “You know, Lou, I think it could be months before we can go out with someone and have a good time.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.”

“Mmhmm… And even longer before we feel comfortable enough to kiss or have sex with someone new.”

Louis propped himself up on his elbows and looked over at Harry in confusion. “I had sex with him. I mean, he blew me and I gave him a hand job, but it’s still sex.”

While Louis spoke, Harry rolled over onto his side and watched him, waiting for him to say he was kidding, but he knew that Louis wasn’t joking. 

“You had sex?” Harry rolled back onto his back and sighed. “I haven’t had sex in almost a year.”

●●●

“For Christmas, I’m getting you two vintage scarves and some of that fancy olive oil and balsamic vinegar that you like.” Louis was lying on the floor in Harry’s kitchen, his upper body in the cabinet under the sink. “Wrench.”

The toolbox was overflowing with assorted screwdrivers, but there was only one wrench, so Harry passed it to him. “Why are you telling me what you’re getting me for Christmas? It’s not even Thanksgiving.” Louis’ gift from Harry was wrapped and hidden in the back of his closet. Harry had already finished his Christmas shopping.

A grunt came from under the sink and then Louis said, “So you can compare and then you’ll know what to get me.” He scooted out from the cabinet and sat up, wrench in hand. Harry couldn’t help but smile at him, he looked ridiculous in his old flannel and baggy jeans that Harry thought he’d gotten rid of. Apparently he kept them around for handyman jobs, another thing Harry hadn’t known Louis could do, until his garbage disposal had started acting up while Louis was hanging out one night.

“You’re freaking me out in those clothes. I swear that’s the same outfit you wore on the drive here from college.” Harry leaned over from his spot on the floor to open the fridge and pull out two beers. He passed one to Louis who opened his with his belt buckle and offered to do the same for Harry. “Where did you learn—You know what, never mind.”

“Niall thinks it’s weird that we hang out all the time.”

They didn’t talk about Niall very often, or Liam for that matter. For Harry it was more that he was constantly frustrated with Liam and didn’t want to complain or talk negatively about him behind his back, so he just never said anything. Liam was still seeing the married guy, it was going on three years, and it was increasingly frustrating for Harry, especially now that they were living together. But Harry had no idea why Louis didn’t talk about Niall. Harry knew he was Louis’ friend, knew he was his roommate, but had never met him. “Why’s it weird?”

“He says it’s weird that we’re friends because I like being around you and I find you attractive, but we’re not dating.”

Harry made a face like he’d eaten something rotten. “I don’t want to date you.”

Louis laughed at him. “It’s mutual, Harry, we’ve actually discussed this before.” Louis pushed his bare toes into Harry’s side, trying to knock him over. “I think Niall’s jealous. He says he’s happy, but he never goes out, except for work stuff, which admittedly is a lot of eating at nice restaurants, but he doesn’t date or hang out with anyone other than me. He’s bored, I think.”

“Could be. How’d your date go last night?” Harry grabbed Louis’ toes and pulled, popping two of them at once. 

“Ow, asshole.” Louis jerked his foot out of Harry’s grip. “It was alright.”

“Going to go for a second date with this one?”

“Nope.”

“But you slept together.” It wasn’t a question. Harry knew Louis had, he always did.

Louis nodded and drained his bottle of beer.

●●●

“Good call on the matinee. I really wanted to go opening night, but I would’ve been in a shitty mood all the next day at work.” Harry dumped the rest of his popcorn into the trash can and stuck his hands in his pockets. “Where to now?”

“I don’t know, want to grab a…” Louis looked at his watch. “Well, it’s not lunch and it’s not dinner. But we can go eat if you’re hungry.”

“Yeah, the popcorn is all I’ve eaten actually. I missed breakfast this morning.”

Louis opened the exit door and they left the theater in the direction of their favorite cafe. “Did you like the movie?”

“Of course. It’s Harry Potter.” Harry grinned. He was glad that Louis had come with him to the movie, that way he could run his mouth to him, over-analyzing the differences between the book and the film.

“Feels like I’m at this theater all the time now.” 

“Did you bring another date here? What’d you see?”

“Hmm?” Louis raised his eyebrows. “Oh, I don’t remember. But yeah, I was here with a date last weekend.”

“Someone new?”

“Yeah, he was great too. Big cock.”

“Jesus, Louis.” Harry opened the door to the cafe and let Louis go inside. “You make me not want to date _anyone._ I’m especially glad I didn’t date _you.”_

“Yeah? Me too.” Louis bopped Harry on the head with the menu.

After they ordered, Harry sipped his water and watched Louis while he stacked up all of the creamer cups into a pyramid. “How do you do it?”

“Oh, it’s easy. The lids are flat, so they stack—” 

“No.” Harry interrupted and knocked down the pyramid. “How do you do it? How do you sleep with these people and just leave? What do you say?”

The creamer cups were already arranged to form the base of a new pyramid, so Louis worked while he talked. “I just lie. Say I have an early meeting or an appointment. Haircut, tennis game, whatever.”

“You don’t play tennis.”

“Yeah, but they don’t know that. They just met me. It’s our first date. And I know I’m not going to see them again, so who cares if I lie a little.” Louis shrugged and carefully placed the last creamer cup on top.

“That’s disgusting.” Harry knocked it down again. “I’m so glad I never got involved with you. You’d have lied about your identity for all I know, told me you had a charity soccer tournament that you had to rush off to, and then I never would’ve seen or heard from you again.” 

Their food arrived and Harry cleared the creamer cups away to make room for his chef salad. While he drizzled the oil and vinegar over it, he asked, “I mean, do these guys even have a good time?”

“Yeah, of course they do. No one’s complaining.”

“You’re out the door too fast. You don’t give them time to complain. How do you know they enjoy it?”

Louis looked at him and squinted. “You _do_ know how sex works, right? It hasn’t been _that_ long.”

“Of course I know how sex works, Louis.” Harry pointed his fork at Louis and said, “But just because they come, doesn’t mean it was any good for them. God, maybe they’re just ready to be done with it as you are. There you are, thinking of bizarre excuses to leave, and they’re trying to think of reasons to throw you out.”

“Nope. No way.” Louis took a bite of his burger and continued talking around his mouthful of food. “I know they enjoy it. They can’t fake that.”

“Sure they can. I’ve done it. Even when I was with Joe, sometimes it just wasn’t good. Like if the prep wasn’t thorough, or if he couldn’t hit my spot the right way, or his rhythm was off, anything. Sometimes it was just me having a shitty day and wanting to get him off so I could take a bath. So… I encouraged him, so to speak. I’d come, yeah, but in those instances, I’d rather have jacked off in the shower.” Harry hummed and took a bite of his salad, thinking of how incredibly wrong Louis was. He swallowed and took a sip of water. 

Louis shook his head and continued eating his burger. While he watched Louis, an idea came to Harry, and though he knew he’d be slightly embarrassed, he thought for sure that Louis would be even more embarrassed and possibly he’d rethink some of his recent behavior. 

Harry popped a crouton in his mouth and chewed it slowly, humming slightly, as if it were the most delicious square of toasted stale bread he’d ever eaten in his entire life. Leaning his head against the back of the booth, Harry closed his eyes and let out a breathy moan, followed by a low growl. He peeked through his eyelids to make sure that Louis was watching, and he was, but he looked a little concerned, like he wasn’t sure if Harry was choking or ill or what. So Harry dialed it up a notch. 

“Oh, yeah.” Harry bit down on his lip and whined, he was trying to get his courage up. He’d only been really vocal with Joe a few times, so he had to get in the right headspace. “Fuck, yeah. God, Louis.” Harry ran his fingers through his hair and kept talking. “So good, yeah, right there. Oh. Oh. Oh.” He groaned and shook his head side to side. “Yes, yes, Louis, you’re so… nnnngh… so big. Yeah, fuck me.” Harry peeked again, while keeping up the wanton moans, to see Louis staring open mouthed with slightly flushed cheeks. “Harder, baby, harder. Yes! Fuck, ohhh, fuck, do it. Come on, Louis, do it, yeah.” Harry reached up and pulled at his hair, moaning long and low. “Yeah, yeah, uh-huh, fuck, you’re so good. So good. Can’t believe it. Louis.” That time he dragged the vowels of Louis’ name, ignoring the strange feeling in his stomach. When Harry started with the nonsensical noises and grunts, he peeked again to find Louis still staring, cheeks red, eyes a little glassy. Time to wrap it up. As he slammed both hands flat on the table, Harry bounced in his seat, like he was riding a cock, losing himself in the moment. “Yeah, yes, deeper. Oh, oh, fuck, Louis, I’m… Oh, shit, oh… I’m gonna… I’m close. I’m gonna…” He slammed his hands on the table again, arched his back and shuddered, then he opened his eyes and blatantly watched Louis as he finished his performance. Harry trailed his hands down over his chest, exaggerating his breathing, and letting one last moan escape before he sat back, smoothed his hair, took a sip of water, picked up his fork and proceeded to eat his salad while Louis stared on, in obvious shock over what Harry had just done.

●●●

“Are you and Niall putting up a tree?” The snow crunched under Harry’s heavy winter boots and he pulled his hat lower in an effort to keep his ears warm. Winter had come early this year, snow on the ground and it wasn’t even Christmas yet.

Louis kicked at a clump of snow and shrugged. “Nah, I don’t think so. Niall won’t be around and I don’t want to deal with all of that… Pulling out ornaments and shit. I’ll end up drunk and break them all.” Louis was still wearing his converse, though hopefully not for long. Harry had almost given him his Christmas gift early when he saw the thin canvas shoes on Louis’ feet, but maybe almost freezing his toes off would make him appreciate the boots more when he opened them on Christmas Day. At least he was wearing a hat and gloves. Progress.

“Liam wants to put up a tree and I said it was fine.” Harry stuffed his gloved hands into his coat pockets, feeling around for his chapstick. “Joe took all the ornaments and stuff. I mean, it was all his anyway, so I don’t care.” Aha. He found his chapstick. Harry was struggling to open the cap with his fuzzy gloves, so Louis snatched it out of his hand and opened it for him, then looked up at Harry, pointed the tube at his mouth and made a kissy face. Harry mimicked him, pouting and closing his eyes while Louis smeared the chapstick on his lips. And his chin. “Thanks, Lou. Try to keep it on my mouth next time. I didn’t want that all over my face.”

“I had a date say that last week.”

“Shut up.” Harry elbowed him as they continued walking toward Harry’s apartment. “Hey, they have trees for sale. Look.” He stopped and pointed across the street. “Let’s get one for Liam. You can help me carry it. Use those legs for something other than running out the door after your dates.” 

Harry hurried across the street, his boots gripped the snowy ground and made it easy to escape from Louis’ attempted revenge. By the time Louis joined him on the sidewalk, he was grumbling about icy roads and boots and not about Harry’s comment. 

“This one. Get this one, Harry.” Louis looked like an elf, smiling from ear to ear and shaking the snow off of the biggest tree on the lot. 

Harry shook his head and moved toward the seven foot trees. “That won’t fit in my apartment. Would fit in yours though.” 

“Not this year.” Louis said as he walked behind a row of trees. “Get this one.” He dragged a blue spruce around and stood it up in front of Harry. “It’s perfect.”

A few minutes of bargaining with the salesperson knocked five dollars off the price and Harry was happy. Louis tipped the tree over, picked up the top, and started dragging it down the sidewalk without waiting for Harry to pick up the trunk. Harry stumbled after him and tripped on a small drift of snow, but managed not to fall. He finally grabbed hold of the trunk of the tree, heaved it up and they trudged through the snow to Harry’s building.

“Imagine carrying that giant tree up those stairs, Lou.” Harry’s voice was slightly muffled because he was on the floor wiggling the upper half of his body under his bed. He grunted and huffed and slowly pushed himself out from under the bed, dragging a Christmas tree stand with him, then sat up and leaned his back against the mattress. Louis was watching him, with one of his grins that meant he either had a secret or Harry had food in his teeth. “What?” Harry rubbed a hand over his face, feeling for stray bits of lettuce on his face. “What is it?”

“You’ve got dust bunnies in your hair.” 

Disgusted that he’d gotten something gross in his hair and slightly embarrassed that he had that much dust under his bed, Harry shook out his curls and raked his fingers through his hair. “Did I get it?” 

“No, you just spread it around.” Louis crawled over from where he’d been sitting against the door and started to pull the dust out Harry’s hair. His face was screwed up in concentration, as he continued carefully running his fingers through the ends of Harry’s curls where they’d apparently trailed on the floor, getting as much of the dust as he could. “Afraid you’re going to have to shower to get it all. Pull it back or something, let’s put the tree up. You said Liam wants to decorate it, right?” 

Louis tucked one of Harry’s curls behind his ear and sat back on his knees. There was a stash of hair ties on Harry’s bedside table, where he dropped them when he sometimes went to bed at night with his hair still up, so he grabbed one and slipped it over his wrist. Harry combed his fingers through his hair and pulled part of it back, looping the hair tie around and putting half of his hair into a little ponytail on top of his head. He reached back and patted it and then tugged at it a bit. It was getting long, but not long enough. It was so frustrating. He wished he’d never cut it short again, growing it out was such a long process. Harry sighed and looked over to find Louis watching him with his head tilted slightly, an unreadable expression on his face. 

Louis reached over and twisted one of his fingers around a tendril of Harry’s hair, but before Harry could wonder too much about what Louis was thinking, Louis cleared his throat and said, “Dust bunny. We missed one.” Then he climbed to his feet and offered Harry his hand.

Louis’ hand was warm and dry, and he heaved Harry to his feet with very little effort. Harry was impressed against his will and knocked Louis out of his way by shoving the tree stand into his chest. They raced to the Christmas tree, both of them in socked feet, sliding around on the floor, and ended in a tangled heap on the couch, the tree stand forgotten on the floor while they laughed.

It took them a good two hours to get the tree up to Harry’s satisfaction. By the time they were finished, the tree had been in every possible place in the room twice, they’d finished the only six-pack of beer in the refrigerator, and they were both sticky with tree sap and itchy from the needles.

“Pizza.”

A grunt of assent came from Louis’ end of the couch, so Harry called their favorite place and ordered their usual, and they settled in to watch the DVD of _Casablanca_ that Louis had bought Harry for his birthday. 

Halfway through the movie, Liam called. Harry answered with a whispered, “What’s up?”

“I’m not coming home. At a hotel, okay?”

“I kind of figured. Have fun.” It was all Harry could say, really. “We’ll decorate the tree tomorrow.”

“I thought you’d have it done when I got home.”

“I don’t know where your ornaments are and I don’t have any. It was all Joe’s stuff.”

“I don’t have any ornaments.”

Harry pulled away from where he’d been snuggled up to Louis so he could focus on Liam. “But you wanted a tree. You said you wanted to decorate a tree, Liam.”

“I said I wanted a tree and I wanted to decorate the apartment, but I meant, like… I don’t know. I just wanted the apartment decorated.” 

“We can talk about this later. Just… be careful.”

Harry scooted over, leaned back, and pulled his legs up onto the couch to finish watching the movie. In his head, he was already making a list of stores to visit for vintage Christmas decorations, but was pulled out of his daydreams when Louis nudged his thigh with his foot.

Louis’ eyes were still on the television screen, but he was still gently poking Harry with his toes when he spoke. “So, we’re shopping for ornaments and shit tomorrow?”

“I suppose.” Harry smacked Louis’ foot away and when he came back for more, trying to poke him hard enough to hurt, Harry grabbed tight and started pulling his toes until they popped. Louis howled and Harry threw the blanket at him. “Hush. It’s the end. Watch.”

Their faces were lit by the glow from the television, and Harry turned to look at Louis as the airplane took off on screen. Together they said the last line along with Humphrey Bogart, _“Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”_

Harry turned off the TV, stood up and leaned from side to side, stretching his back and arms. “You sleeping here?” 

“Yeah, it’s late. I’m too lazy to move now.” Louis straightened the blanket out on top of him and caught the pillow when Harry picked it up from the floor and tossed to him. “Goodnight, Harry.”

“‘Night, Lou.” Harry said around a yawn. “Thanks for helping with the tree.” He checked the locks on the door and wandered down the hall to take a quick shower before falling into his bed.

The next morning, Harry awoke to the sound of a door slamming shut. His room was still dim, so it was fairly early, and he stared up at the ceiling for a few minutes before rolling out of bed. When he caught his reflection in the mirror over his dresser, he laughed. He’d gone to bed with wet hair and it looked like it. His hair curled and stuck up at all angles one side and was mostly flat on the other. The perils of naturally curly hair—he couldn’t brush it and wear it down, it would be frizzy and crazy looking. Louis called it his mad scientist look. Instead, he finger combed it back and tied the top half of his hair into a bun, then did the same to the bottom half. He squinted at himself in the mirror. Louis was sure to make fun of this, probably call him a show pony or something. At least it was cold enough to wear a beanie while they were out shopping later.

Louis was puttering around in the kitchen when Harry finally padded down the hall in his slippers and flannel pajamas. Harry was mid-yawn when Louis turned around and handed him a cup of coffee. “Sorry. I probably woke you with the door, but my hands were full.” He wrinkled his brow, then motioned for Harry to turn around. “Oh, I thought you’d finally gotten it all up in one thingy.”

“Thingy?”

“Shut up. You know what I mean. A bun or whatever.” Louis waved a hand and bit into a plain croissant. There was a box of croissants and muffins from Harry’s favorite bakery sitting open on the counter, so Harry dug through to find an almond croissant. Harry couldn’t understand him sometimes. Louis didn’t even like sweets. He could have gotten them sausage biscuits from the diner that he liked, it was a block closer than the bakery. That train of thought derailed when Louis hit him in the forehead with a piece of croissant. “Harold. Did you hear me? Eat up and let’s go buy your Christmas decorations. Don’t have all day, you know, I’ve got a date tonight.”

●●●

At Harry’s favorite thrift store, he found a box of vintage Scandinavian straw ornaments and a red felt tree skirt and decided he was set. He hauled the box up to the counter, but asked the owner to hold onto them while he searched the store for Louis. He found him in the back corner, looking over a display of antique mercury glass ornaments that were hanging on an old fireplace screen. 

Harry stood behind him and rested his chin on Louis’ shoulder. “I found what I want, Lou. We can go.” 

Louis gently spun a silver ball and said, “We should get these. They’re so cool.” 

“I don’t want glass ones. They’re pretty, but...” Harry stepped around Louis and touched one of them. “There’s a big box of unbreakable stuff up at the register already. I’m set.”

Louis crossed his arms and bumped his shoulder against Harry’s. “Yeah, well, I want these.”

Harry knocked their shoulders together again. “You don’t have a tree.”

“Yes, I do.” Louis elbowed him in the ribs, not quite hard enough to hurt. “ _We_ have a tree.”

“No, _we_ don’t.” Harry knocked their hips together, sending Louis staggering sideways. He turned to face him to continue, “ _I_ have a tree in _my_ apartment.” 

“No. _We_ have a tree in _your_ apartment.” Louis said while stalking closer. “I helped carry it and set it up and I’m going to help decorate it.” They were toe to toe at this point, both of them scowling at each other, with their arms crossed in front of their chests.

For a few seconds, Harry was still completely and irrationally angry, but over the past year he’d learned how to deal with Louis when he was acting stubborn. “I don’t want breakable ornaments.”

Louis heaved a dramatic sigh and looked over at the ornaments, then he lowered his voice and muttered, “We should, um, I don’t know… compromise or something.”

“I will… okay. I will _compromise_ and you can put some of these on the tree. But, you have to store them at your place.”

“Yeah, alright.” Louis started plucking ornaments off of the display and hanging them on the fingers of his left hand. When that hand was full, he grabbed Harry’s hands, gestured for him to spread his fingers apart and started hanging ornaments on all ten of his fingers. When Harry’s hands were full, Louis picked up a box that Harry hadn’t noticed and hauled it all up to the front of the store.

“What’s in the box, Lou?”

“Oh. Lights.” Louis slid the box onto the counter and opened it for Harry to take a peek inside. Vintage Christmas lights that looked like little candles. Perfect.

●●●

“Where are you going for your date tonight? Movies again?” Harry was crammed between the couch, the wall, and the tree, trying to plug in the lights without knocking over the tree or disturbing the tree skirt that he’d draped around the trunk.

“Shit.” Louis froze, holding an ornament in each hand. “Shit. Shit. Shit. I forgot.” He carefully placed the ornaments back in the box and patted his pockets, then looked around the room. Harry knew he was searching for his phone.

“You left it in the kitchen.” Harry answered Louis’ unspoken question, then crawled out from behind the tree. “You’ve got time, right?” Harry dusted his hands off and turned toward the kitchen to see Louis checking his phone. 

While he scrolled, he hummed, then again said, “Shit.” He dropped his phone to the counter and looked down at his clothes. The same clothes he’d worn the day before that were slept in and dirty and probably sticky with tree sap. “I’m late. Like, I don’t have time to go home and get ready. I should just cancel, I guess. I hate to do that.”

For once, Louis sounded genuinely excited for a date and Harry didn’t want him to have to cancel. There had to be something they could do. “Okay… Let’s see… How about just shower here? I’ll go see what I’ve got in my closet that’ll fit you.” Harry smiled and shooed Louis off toward the bathroom.

While Louis showered, Harry dug through his clothes. A few minutes later, he’d found a soft blue sweater and a pair of dark jeans that he thought might actually belong to Liam. Louis was still in the shower, so Harry called through the door, “Hey, I’ve got clothes for you. And, for reasons I won’t get into, Liam has a bunch of packages of brand new underwear, so you’re set.”

“Thanks so much, man.” Louis yelled back. Harry could hear him turn off the water and pull back the shower curtain. Even with the door shut, he could smell his soap, and for some reason, the thought of Louis going on a date smelling like Harry was quite satisfying. Louis opened the door and Harry was still standing right outside. “Oh. Hey, so yeah… thank you. I’m really looking forward to this one.”

“Yeah?” Harry smiled. It was about time Louis had a _real_ date to look forward to. 

Louis walked into Harry’s bedroom, the towel slung around his waist, and looked down at the clothes laid out on the bed. “Yeah, for sure. Remember when I had that free trial month at that gym? Saw this guy in the locker room. He is _hung._ And I am _horny.”_ Louis dropped his towel and Harry spun around in the doorway, but not before he got an eyeful of Louis’ ass. 

“God, Louis. I thought…” Harry turned back around with his eyes squeezed shut. “Are you decent?”

“Huh? I’ve got underwear on, if that’s what you mean.”

Harry opened his eyes and, yep, Louis had underwear on. “I thought you _liked_ this guy.” Harry watched him bend over and step into the jeans. “You… ugh. Fine. Whatever. Don’t get any… fluids on my clothes.” 

“Promise.” Louis grinned and winked. “Hey, so do you have a date for New Year’s Eve?”

“Not as of now, no.”

“Okay, well, I don’t have one either, but let’s give it until my birthday and if we’re both still dateless, we’ll go to the Matthews’ party together.”

“Yeah, sounds like more fun than hanging out with some guy I probably haven’t even met yet.”

Louis pulled his coat on and tugged his beanie over his wet hair. “I’m off. Wish me luck.”

“Luck.” Harry deadpanned and stuck his tongue out at Louis’ smiling face before shutting the door.

●●●

“Where’s Liam?” Louis brushed his hair across his forehead and stepped inside Harry’s apartment. “I thought he was coming to the party too. Can’t believe we’ve been friends for a year and we've never hung out.”

Without answering, Harry turned and walked down the hall to his room. He’d spent an hour trying to convince Liam to come to the party, but no; Benjamin had promised to meet him after midnight in some swanky hotel, so Liam was already there, probably strewing rose petals all over the bed and carpet or something equally… Well, equally romantic. 

Harry sighed and opened the top drawer of his dresser to look for his blue scarf. It was endlessly frustrating living with Liam and seeing first hand the highs and lows that he experienced because of this stupid affair. When he finally found his scarf, he untangled it from the rest and smoothed it out between his hands.

“Want me to do it?” Louis quietly asked while he leaned against the doorjamb watching Harry grumble to himself. He’d shaved. Harry hadn’t even noticed at first.

With a quick nod, Harry shut the drawer and stepped away from the dresser to sit on the corner of his bed. Louis was so much better and faster at tying the scarves, they always stayed put and Harry never had to adjust them. “Lou, I don’t want to talk about Liam, okay?”

“I figured.” Louis nudged Harry’s head so he would lean forward. He tied the knot at the back and tugged a curl. “It’s fine. You ready?”

Harry stood in front of his mirror. The party was supposed to be cocktail attire, but Harry was sick of wearing ties all of the time for work, so he’d decided to skip it. His black suit was well-fitted and one of his favorites, but he’d decided to wear something a little different underneath. A dark blue floral print blouse he’d found in his favorite thrift shop with the top few buttons undone. It matched his headscarf perfectly. “Yeah, I think.” He pursed his lips, still looking at himself in the mirror. “Do you think I look okay?”

“Harold, you look more than okay. If I didn’t know you, I’d probably want to fuck you.” Louis laughed as Harry spun around and tried to punch him in the shoulder. “Good thing I know you.”

“Yeah… This’ll be fun.” Harry looked him up and down, they’d accidentally coordinated their outfits. Louis’ suit was a blue very similar to Harry’s shirt and scarf. “You look nice, Lou. It’s weird seeing your smooth face.”

The cab ride to the party was quiet. Harry couldn’t stop thinking about Liam, alone in his hotel room, and probably anxiously waiting for Benjamin who probably wouldn’t be there until one in the morning. Was it better to be alone? Dates had been few and far between. Harry had gone out a few times since the breakup, but none of them felt right and he wasn’t interested in forcing himself on a second date. Sex though, he missed sex. God, he missed sex. But it wasn’t something that he wanted with someone he didn’t love. Sometimes he felt like he was naive or stupid to feel that way, so when he’d been on his last date, he’d seriously considered just going home with the guy. The thought of the guy wanting him to leave immediately afterward was what changed his mind. He couldn’t do it. 

Harry’s opinion was that New Year’s Eve was always kind of a let down. It’s always planned as a big, meaningful event, but it almost always ends up consisting of a crowded room, bad music, cheap champagne, boring food, and incredibly drunk people shouting as they count down from ten, then singing the wrong words to Auld Lang Syne loudly and off-key. 

This party was the most fun Harry’d had ringing in the new year in… well, forever, probably. He and Louis had snuck a bottle of champagne out onto the terrace as soon as they’d walked into the room, and shared the entire thing while hiding in a dark corner, still bundled up in their coats and scarves. When they finally joined the festivities, they were pretty drunk, especially since they’d bypassed the food table. The next half-hour or so was spent hanging by the hors d'oeuvres, waiting for them to refill the platters of crabcakes and mushroom caps, then shoveling as many into their mouths as they could. Eventually, the chef came out and stared at them until they decided to take over the dance floor. And take over, they did. With neither of them knowing the other had done it, they’d both learned the entire routine from the _Friends_ episode “The One With The Routine” and they did it four times, each of them trying to catch the other twice and failing spectacularly, before they got tired and decided to find a place to sit. 

After a rest they were back on the dance floor, spinning and shimmying and doing the Macarena and the Electric Slide of all things. Harry’s stomach hurt from laughing and his face hurt from smiling so much. They were standing there in the middle of the dance floor, laughing at each other, when a slow song came on. Harry started to walk off the dance floor and look for something to drink, but Louis grabbed his hand and spun him around, still smiling.

Louis pulled him close and said,“Let’s dance.” He dropped his hands to Harry’s waist and swayed their bodies together to the music. 

Harry rolled his eyes and looped his arms around Louis’ neck. “This is nice. With your beard gone, we can dance cheek to cheek.” Harry grinned and laughed a little, then rubbed their cheeks together before settling into the sway and warmth of their dance. Lost in the music, Harry moved where Louis steered him, resting his head on Louis’ shoulder. Louis was so warm and so kind and Harry felt so lucky to have him. Without realizing it, he’d buried his face against Louis’ neck, but Louis didn't seem to mind, so Harry stayed there, breathing in the scent of his skin. Harry yawned, big and wide, and his lower lip caught and dragged across the skin of Louis’ neck. He jumped back. “Sorry, Lou. I yawned on your neck.”

They stood about a foot apart, no longer touching, as the song played out the last chords. Harry didn’t know where to look, he was drunk, flushed and hyped up from dancing, and he was nervous, but he wasn’t sure why and he felt silly for even feeling that way. Maybe it was just the champagne… 

The crowd began to chant along for the countdown, and Harry realized that everyone was paired up into couples who were holding each other. His stomach dropped. He’d been having so much fun that he’d forgotten that New Year’s Eve was such a couple holiday, but before he could get too down about it, Louis grabbed his hand and led him through the crowd, back out onto the terrace. There were some people outside, but it wasn’t nearly as crowded, and there looked to be a few other single people too. It somehow made Harry feel less alone. He and Louis counted down along with the rest of the party and shouted and cheered when it struck midnight, but suddenly it seemed like everyone was kissing and Harry didn’t know what to do. Louis was watching him, a small smile on his lips, but he kept looking off to either side, not keeping eye contact, so Harry plastered a big smile on his face and shouted over the din, “Happy New Year, Lou!”

Louis’ grin grew wide and he shouted back, then held his arms out for a hug, which Harry gratefully accepted. As he pulled away, Louis brushed a quick kiss on Harry’s lips, turned and yelled into the night sky, “Happy New Year!” which started the rest of the small crowd on the terrace shouting and Harry giggling. 

He’d had so much fun, but he was very tired and very drunk and very ready to go home. They wove their way through the crowd inside and grabbed a couple of crabcakes each, then got their coats and headed outside to catch a cab. The cab dropped Louis off first and they made tentative plans for Louis to come over the next day after they’d slept off their hangovers. 

In the quiet of the taxi, Harry’s mind drifted as he rested his head against the back of the seat and looked out the window. New year, new goals. Resolutions always seemed so unreachable, small goals were easier to achieve. Goal number one: go on a date. Harry would work on the rest of his list later. Right now, he wanted to get his key into the lock and get inside his apartment, then he could go to sleep. Hopefully, he’d get his clothes off first. Finally, the key slid home and Harry opened the door, expecting a quiet, dark apartment. Instead, he found the Christmas tree lit, the television on, and Liam curled up in a ball on the couch crying.

The sight of his best friend in tears sobered Harry slightly, at least enough to allow him to take of his coat, suit jacket and tie, kick off his shoes, turn off the television, unplug the Christmas lights without toppling the tree, and climb onto the couch behind Liam. Without saying a word, Harry pulled the blanket over them, wrapped an arm around Liam’s middle, and pulled him close. There was no need to ask what had happened, he knew. Another disappointment, another excuse, another heartbreak. Liam deserved so much more, deserved to have someone who loved him equally, who respected him and treated him well, but Harry couldn’t make that happen. No matter how many times Harry tried to encourage Liam to give this up, Liam wouldn’t do it. He was holding on so tight to the idea that Benjamin would finally leave his wife, even though he had to know it would never happen. There was nothing Harry could do to ease Liam’s pain, so he did the only thing he could do, and let Liam cry in his arms until they both fell asleep.


	4. 2006-2007

**2006**

A wailing alarm sounded and Harry’s eyes flew open. He squeezed them shut and took a deep breath, trying to force the nausea away. The sound was coming from somewhere nearby, but he was trapped, stuck between the back of the couch and… someone. Carefully, he cracked open one eye to see the back of a familiar head full of brown hair. Liam. 

“Liam.” Harry wiggled, trying to free himself so he could search for the source of the horrible blaring noise. 

A grunt and a whine and Liam awoke with a start and promptly fell off the couch. “Oh, god, shut up. Shut up. Fuck.” 

Harry looked over the edge of the couch. Liam was fumbling with his phone, trying to turn it off, and he finally managed it. He tossed the phone to the side and dropped his face back down onto the rug with a tortured moan. Harry attempted to sit up and immediately gave up on that idea. His head was pounding and he was almost certain that he would throw up if he moved again anytime soon. 

“Liam?” Harry whispered, and even that sounded louder than necessary. “Did the alarm stop? Because I think I still hear it.”

A muffled sound came from the floor, then Liam answered quietly, “It stopped.” Harry heard a rustling sound, then a warm hand brushed the hair off of his face. “How bad off are you?”

“I may have had an entire bottle of champagne to myself.” Harry winced at the sound of his own voice. “Possibly more. You?”

“I’m fine. I didn’t drink much last night.” Liam’s voice was further away, Harry hoped he was in the kitchen making coffee. 

Harry let it go. They'd talk about it later, when Harry didn’t feel like dying. He must have fallen back asleep because the next thing he knew, Liam was combing his fingers through the tangled mess of Harry’s hair, whispering the magic words: _coffee, water, ibuprofen,_ and _I brought the trash can, just in case._

By some miracle, Harry didn’t need the trash can. He managed to stomach the ibuprofen and a few sips of water, but the coffee had gone cold by the time he sat up and reached for it. Liam had disappeared into his bedroom, so Harry spent about five minutes mentally preparing himself to stand up, then stumbled down the hall to the bathroom where he stood under the shower until the water ran cold. 

Thankfully, Harry’s favorite lie-around-the-house clothes were clean, and he didn’t have to look for them because he’d had the foresight to set them out before they went out the night before. He pulled on his soft, well-worn, black sweatpants, skipping the underwear because no one should have to be confined by their clothes when they’re hungover, and gingerly pulled his red Adidas hoodie over his head. When he opened his door, he could hear Liam puttering around in the kitchen, so he stepped into his fuzzy slippers and went to join him.

“I’m glad I showered while you were still sleeping.” Liam smiled and handed Harry a fresh cup of coffee. His face was blotchy and his eyes were rimmed with red.

Harry took his coffee and set it on the kitchen counter, then pulled Liam in for a hug. They stood there, holding onto each other for a few minutes, then Harry whispered, “I love you, Li. I worry about you, you know.”

Liam nodded and hugged Harry a little tighter. “My New Year’s resolution is to go on a date. A real one.”

“Hey, that’s my first goal for this year too.” Harry loosened his grip and took a step back to pick up his coffee. While he sipped it, an idea came to him. 

He’d talk to Louis whenever Louis woke up and finally found his way to Harry’s apartment. There had better be a box of croissants in his hands when he showed up, or what was the use.

**●●●**

“I’m not coming over.” Louis croaked through the phone.

“What? Why?” Harry whined. He couldn't help it; he was hungry and had been waiting patiently for his almond croissants. 

“Can’t move. Too hungover. Think I might be dead.” Louis really sounded awful and Harry was actually starting to feel sympathetic. “Yep. Dead. Calling you from the great beyond.” He finished in a spooky whisper.

“Even when you’re dead, you’re annoying.” Harry sighed and got up from his bed to look for socks and shoes. “I’ll be over in a bit. Make coffee and I’ll bring food.”

Harry found his sneakers and wiggled his feet into them, not bothering to tie the laces. One of Louis’ beanies hung on the back of Harry’s door, so he pulled it over his damp hair, grabbed his coat and looked in the mirror and considered changing into jeans and a sweater. No. He already felt like shit, why not look like it too? He tiptoed through the hall, since Liam was asleep in his room, and left him a note asking him to call or text if he was up for dinner. Harry shoved his sunglasses on his face and stuffed his wallet and keys into his coat pocket. 

It took four buzzes to Louis’ apartment before the door to his building opened for him, and by that time Harry was ready to throw out all of the plain croissants that he’d made sure were _very_ fresh, _just_ for Louis, before buying them. The walk had helped ease his headache a little, but the annoyance of waiting so long for Louis to buzz him up had brought the headache back, so Harry kept his sunglasses on while he trudged up the stairs. When he got to Louis’ door, it was open a crack; he knocked lightly and pushed it, but it caught on something.

Louis’ voice came from right behind the door. He sounded like shit. “Hold on.” 

There was a pitiful groan and a shuffling sound and the door swung open to reveal Louis, sprawled on the floor on his stomach, wearing nothing but his underwear. At least Harry could smell coffee, so Louis wasn’t completely useless today. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” Harry nudged Louis’ ribs with the toe of his sneaker, then stepped over him to take the bakery box to the kitchen. 

“I told you. I died.” Louis moaned and then rolled over onto his back, draping one arm dramatically over his eyes. “I _crawled_ out here to buzz you in. Niall made coffee before he left.” 

“Okay, well, you’re practically naked, so if you’re planning to stay there, I’m going to cover you with a sheet. You know, like at the morgue.” Harry pulled down his favorite rainbow mug and Louis’ regular mug, the one that he pretended to hate, the one with the roosters all over it. Harry had bought it at a second-hand store, highly amused by the idea of Louis drinking from a coffee cup covered in cocks. By the time he’d fixed their coffee and carried the cups into the living room, Louis had miraculously recovered enough to wrap a blanket around his waist and move to the couch.

Harry tried not to be endeared, but Louis was really adorable when he was grumpy, hungover, and quiet. His hair was a complete mess, it stuck straight up on one side and in the back, and there were little specks of dirt clinging to his cheek where he’d been lying with his face on the floor. When he felt like shit, he tended to curl up and make himself as small as possible, hunching over and bending his knees to wrap his arms around himself. Harry found his eyes lingering on the scrunching of Louis’ abs and quickly looked away. Harry reached for his coffee and took a sip, giving himself the chance to collect his thoughts. Louis was objectively attractive, gorgeous really, it was perfectly acceptable to want to look at him, especially when he was mostly naked. 

Harry decided to go find Louis some clothes. 

He returned from Louis’ bedroom with a pair of basketball shorts and an old Chicago Bulls sweatshirt. “Put these on. It’s cold.”

Louis grumbled, but accepted the bundle of clothes, tugged the sweatshirt over his head, then pulled the shorts on, somehow getting completely dressed without moving from his spot on the couch or unwrapping his blanket. He curled back up and stretched his arm out, not actually trying to reach for his coffee, but whining until Harry picked it up and handed it to him. 

“I think I might actually _not_ be dead.” Louis gently rested his head on the back of the couch, then turned to face Harry. “That’s my hoodie.”

“Yeah, but you left it at my place, so it’s mine now.” Harry pulled the hood over his beanie and yanked on the corner of Louis’ blanket until he let Harry unwrap it. They stretched out on the couch, head to foot, covered in an old, fleece, University of Chicago blanket, and settled in to watch football for the rest of the day.

During halftime of the Jets game, Harry fell asleep. Madonna woke him up singing “Hung Up” from the coffee table. Liam’s ringtone. Harry flung his arm out and knocked his phone onto the floor, but managed to pick it up and answer it before it went to voicemail.

“Hey, Li.”

“I’m not up for dinner tonight. Maybe tomorrow, okay?”

“Yeah, that’s fine, man. You need me to bring you anything?”

“No, I ordered pizza. I’m just going to hang out and watch Friends reruns and go to bed early, I think.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I… thanks, Harry. For last night, um, but also… just, um, thank you for being so understanding and… I just love you, okay? You’re my best friend.”

“Li, are you sure you’re alright? I can come home. We’re just watching football.”

“No, you stay there. I need to be alone, I think.”

“Alright, man. I’ll see you later.”

Harry hung up his phone and dropped it onto the rug in front of the couch, rolled onto his back and stretched his arms over his head. A snuffling-snort sound came from the other end of the couch; Louis had fallen asleep too. How to wake him up… 

Harry was too lazy to do anything really creative, so he carefully slipped from under the blanket and stood up. After taking a deep breath and steeling himself, he started flailing his arms and legs and screaming, “Spider! Louis! Spider!” He really put his all into it, and Louis shot up off the couch, almost straight from asleep on his back to standing, spinning and jerking his sweatshirt over his head when Harry pointed at it. But like every single one of Harry’s jokes, he gave it away by laughing uncontrollably. Louis went from freaking out to murderous in a split second. Harry tried to run for it, but he was still bent over mid-laugh and Louis had a head start. He didn’t stand a chance. He was still laughing when Louis tackled him, pinning Harry face down on the couch, trapping Harry’s hands behind his back with one hand, and mercilessly digging his fingers into Harry’s ribs with the other. 

“You asshole! I’m going to fucking kill you. I swear to god.” Louis punctuated his sentences with hard jabs and pokes to the sensitive sides of Harry’s stomach where he could reach. “You suck. Fuck. You. Harry. Styles.” Harry couldn’t stop wiggling and laughing. He thought he might cry, he was laughing so hard. 

Louis always, _always_ got him with jokes and comments and stupid shit, but Harry had neverbeen successful at any sort of revenge because he had the worst poker face. Even as Louis cursed and tickled him, even while he was trying to get out from under Louis’ weight, Harry was mentally celebrating because he had won, sort of. He’d pulled one over on Louis and it felt good. 

It seemed that Louis had given up on the tickling while Harry’s mind had drifted. Instead, he tightened his grip on Harry’s wrist and started pinching Harry’s love handles. And oh. Louis couldn’t know that. Shit. Against his will, Harry’s cock started to fill. He had to get up, get out, get Louis off of his back. Fuck.

“Lou, stop.” Harry whined and it came out a little needier than he’d intended. “Please. I’m sorry. I....” Think fast, Harry, come on. “I’ve got a cramp.”

“Asshole.” Louis hopped up off of Harry’s back and stood next to the couch, but before Harry could even breathe in relief, Louis smacked the shit out of Harry’s ass, and a low moan escaped Harry’s open mouth.

They both went absolutely silent and Harry turned his head to bury his flaming cheeks in the couch cushion. He realized he’d kept his hands where Louis had been holding them, wrists crossed at his lower back, and he dropped them to his sides, but it was too late.

“Harry Styles, you kinky fucker.” Louis laughed and nudged Harry’s shoulder with his knee. “I’m not judging you, man. I might tell Niall though.”

Harry whipped his head back around to peer up at Louis. “What? Why?” That was going to far. Harry had only lied about a spider. 

“I was thinking of setting you up with him.”

“What?”

“I don’t know. He’s lonely and single and gay. You’re lonely and single and gay. Why not? You guys need to meet anyway. I don’t know how we’ve avoided it for a year.”

Harry rolled over onto his back, his semi had finally deflated. “Maybe. Would make it easy to knock my first goal of the year off the list.”

“Yeah, what’s that?”

“Just to go on a date. That’s goal number one.”

Louis bent and picked up Harry’s feet, sitting back down and dropping Harry’s feet into his lap. “I, um, I think that I’d like to try to date someone. Like, more than once.”

Harry couldn't help it. He squealed, “Really?”

“God, Harry, don’t do that. My head still hurts.” Louis pinched the skin on Harry’s ankle. “You’re still an asshole, but if you know anyone who might, I don’t know…”

“Liam.”

“You think?”

“Why not? We’ll trade off best friends. We can go on a double date. It’ll be fun.”

“Yeah, okay. That sounds good actually. We can figure this out later though, I’m too fucking hungover to think right now.”

●●● 

The mountain of clothes was growing larger by the second as Harry curiously watched Liam toss his unacceptable outfits at the bed. Harry folded them as he caught them, and stacked them in a neat pile. Liam had insisted that Harry help him get ready, though up to this point, his help had consisted of looking at himself in the mirror and playing with his slightly longer curls. It had been years since they’d been long enough to actually curl and Harry couldn’t help but smile at them. He’d managed to get them all up into one tiny nub of a ponytail earlier that day.

A bright red shirt landed on Harry’s head. He pulled it off and folded it. “Liam, it’s just dinner. You didn’t even want to go.”

“Yeah, I know, but now I’ve agreed and I can't find anything to wear.” Liam stood up from where he’d been crouched over, searching through the bottom of his closet. “I don’t know why I’m even doing this.”

The pile of folded clothes was large enough for Harry to make the effort to carry them to the dresser and put them away, so he did so, and waited, watching his reflection in the mirror while Liam paced the room. “Something else is bothering you. What’s up?”

“Hand me the red shirt.” 

Harry tossed it to him and asked again, “What’s up?”

While he buttoned his shirt, Liam frowned and finally answered, “Okay, so Benjamin wanted to take me out last night. And you and Louis were off doing something, so… I told him he could come over here to pick me up. Thought we could have a drink, maybe he’d stay.” His shirt was finally buttoned, so Liam looked up. “I thought I’d try to make him jealous, you know? So I sent myself those flowers and—”

“You sent yourself the flowers. I thought… Nevermind. ”

“Yeah, I thought, you know, he’d see them, see the card, see that someone else was interested in me, and he’d… I don’t know, realize what he could lose.”

“What did the card say?”

_“Please say yes. Love, Jonathan.”_ Liam decided on a pair of black pants and sat down on the edge of the bed to put them on. “Doesn’t matter. He cancelled last minute. There was some charity ball or something of his wife’s that he’d forgotten to put in his calendar.”

Liam really needed something good. Louis better be on his best behavior.

●●●

The walk to the restaurant was rather quiet. Harry hadn’t had the chance to call Louis and didn’t want to talk to him with Liam right there at his side, so he hoped that Louis had listened to the numerous lectures he’d given about not sleeping with Liam right away. They were early, of course, Harry was always early for everything, so he and Liam ordered a bottle of wine for the table and an appetizer to tide them over in case Louis and Niall were late. Harry was scooping tomatoes onto a piece of toast and Liam was in the restroom when Louis arrived at the table. Alone.

“Hey, Lou.” Harry passed him the bruschetta he’d just fixed for himself. “Where’s Niall?”

“Taking a piss. Where’s Liam?”

“Same. Listen, he’s had a shitty few days, so like, if at the end of the night, you’re not interested… just… be kind, okay?”

“Of course, Harry. I’m not that much of an asshole.” Louis munched on his toast and reached for his wine, then gestured behind Harry with his glass. Harry turned around and Liam was coming toward the table with another man who Harry could only assume was Niall when he pulled out a chair and joined them.

Harry cleared his throat and rested his hand on Liam’s shoulder. “Liam Payne, this is Louis Tomlinson. My two best friends finally meet.” Harry grinned and clapped quietly, bouncing in his seat while Louis and Liam said hello. 

When Louis introduced Niall, Harry was surprised to learn that he worked for the Post as well, though not in the same department. Niall was a restaurant critic, and apparently none too thrilled with the bruschetta that Harry had ordered.

One bottle of wine didn’t go very far split between four people, and Harry was almost finished with his first glass. He’d stopped focusing on Niall’s rant about bruschetta and was perusing the menu, trying to decide between the salmon and the grouper, and didn’t notice that the waiter was standing at his elbow.

“Sir?”

Harry looked up, slightly startled. “Sorry, I was—”

“Wait until you hear this, Niall. Harry is the best at ordering. His restaurant orders are works of art. You look at a menu and see a meal, Harry sees a puzzle to be taken apart and put back together in a way that even the chef didn’t know was possible. Listen…” Louis smiled and gestured for Harry to continue.

Harry chewed his lip, still torn between two entrees, so he ordered a second bottle of wine and sipped from his glass to stall for a few seconds. “I’ll have the grouper. But the lime butter? I’m not a big fan of lime. Can I have a lemon butter sauce instead, on the side please?” The waiter nodded and started to collect the menus, but Harry continued, “And the scalloped potatoes that come with it, I’d rather have a plain baked potato. Also, I’m not the biggest fan of asparagus, so I’d like to substitute the steamed broccoli. Oh, and can you just… can you put the broccoli in a separate dish? Thank you.” Harry smiled and handed over his menu, then went back to his wine.

All of the dates, well, the few dates, that Harry had been on since the break-up had been with people he’d already known. It was strange, he supposed, that this would be his first blind date in over a year, and with someone who worked for the same publication. Harry hoped it wouldn’t be weird if things didn’t go well. They’d never run into each other at work before, but the opportunity was there, and now that Harry knew what Niall looked like, he’d probably notice him more often. And… he should probably try to participate in the conversation. 

Harry tuned back in to find that he hadn’t really missed anything. Louis was watching him, holding his wine and smiling that half-smile that Harry liked so much. _What?_ Harry silently mouthed across the table, but Louis just rolled his eyes and sipped his wine and turned to ask Liam about the shirt he was wearing.

“Have you been here before, Niall?” Louis asked between bites of toast.

Niall nodded and said, “I reviewed it a few months ago. It’s one of those…” He trailed off and waved his hand in a circle in the air.

Liam spoke up and said, “Restaurants are to people these days what theater was to people in the sixties.” Liam smiled, sipped his wine, and continued in a conspiratorial whisper, “I read that in a newspaper.”

“I wrote that.” Niall replied and lifted his glass of wine to Liam. 

"No way. You wrote that?” They clinked their glasses together and Liam giggled. “I’ve never quoted a newspaper in my life. I can’t believe you wrote that.” He turned to Louis and said, “Can you believe that? What are the chances?”

Louis shrugged and smiled across the table at Harry. “I have no idea.”

Niall propped his elbows on the table. “I also said ‘if I never see another piece of pork belly it’ll be too soon.’”

“Really? That’s amazing. I think I’ve seen that on like… a magnet or something.”

The conversation flowed easily after that, though Harry didn’t spend much time actually talking to his date. Thankfully, Louis was there to entertain him and the rest of the meal passed painlessly. Soon they were bundling up to leave the restaurant.

“I can't believe how long your hair is. Almost as long as the second time we met.” Louis straightened Harry's hat and tugged on a curl. “Looks good, curly.”

Harry beamed at the compliment as he slipped his hands inside his gloves. “Thanks, Lou. Where’s your beanie?”

Louis patted his hands over the pockets of his coat and frowned. “Oh, I... We took a taxi ‘cause we were late. Must have left it.”

“It’s too cold to walk around without a hat, Lou. Good thing I come prepared.” Harry felt around in his pocket and fished out an old blue beanie and pulled it over Louis’ hair. “Now you’re set.”

A little cough came from behind them and Harry stepped out of the way thinking he was blocking someone from getting to the coat rack, but it was Liam. He and Niall were leaning against the wall, already bundled up and ready to leave. Liam stepped closer to Harry and looped his arm around Harry’s elbow and they walked out into the frigid January air.

The date had gone alright, though it didn’t seem like there was much of a spark. Harry didn’t feel a pull or even an attraction to Niall, really, but he didn’t want to let Louis down. If Niall asked, he’d agree to one more date, then he could end it as friends and not feel guilty. He nodded to himself as he and Liam walked down the sidewalk with Louis and Niall just in front of them. 

“Harry! Look…gold boots!” Liam tugged on Harry’s arm and pulled him over to a window display while Louis and Niall walked on. “Are you going to go out with him again?”

“Hmm?”

“Niall. Do you like him?”

“Not really, I mean, he’s fine. It was fine. But I’m not interested in him that way.”

“Good because I am. I feel like… I don’t know. Like there’s a connection there. I think it could _be_ something.” Liam smiled, a genuine smile, one that Harry hadn’t seen in quite some time. 

“That’s great, Li. Really. Just, um, don’t… can you maybe wait a few days or something? Louis is sort of... vulnerable right now.”

“Yeah, sure. You’ll get his number for me?”

“Of course. No problem.”

They hurried to catch up to Niall and Louis who had stopped at the corner to wait for them and appeared to be deep in conversation. Harry frowned as they approached the pair. Louis didn’t seem as happy as he had earlier in the evening and he wondered what could have happened in the last few minutes to take his smile away. Harry stepped closer and tilted his head, about to ask what was bothering him.

Niall stretched his arms overhead and yawned big and loud. “It’s been lovely, guys, but I am incredibly tired. I’m just gonna…” He reached his arm out to flag down a taxi. “Take a cab.”

“Oh, me too!” Liam let go of Harry’s arm and hurried over to the cab where Niall was holding the door and slipped inside, followed closely by Niall who shut the door behind him. They were gone.

Harry could feel that his mouth was hanging open, but he didn’t care. He turned to see that Louis was wearing a similar expression and when their eyes met, they both started cackling. They laughed until Harry’s eyes were watering and he backed up to lean against the side of the building. 

“Well, I guess the date went well, but not the date we started out with.” Louis giggled into his hand and stood close enough to Harry that they could share their warmth.

“I’m glad though.”

“Yeah?” Louis asked, almost whispering. And Harry was once again drawn into the brilliant blue of his eyes. They were unfairly gorgeous and sometimes it was hard not to stare. 

“Yeah.” Harry looked down at his feet and briefly thought about the gold boots in the window display. He pushed himself off the wall and backed away from Louis. “I didn’t want to have to break Niall’s heart, you know. It would’ve been messy. He would’ve fallen in love with me, but I could never love a man who doesn’t love bruschetta.” As usual, Harry was laughing before he finished his sentence.

The wind picked up and cut through the heavy knit of Harry’s sweater, so he pulled his coat close around his waist and crossed his arms. “Where do you think they went? Yours or mine?”

“I… I have no idea. I didn’t even think of that. One of us is kicked out either way.”

Just then Harry’s phone vibrated in his back pocket. A text from Liam. They were going to Harry’s place because it was closer.

“Looks like we’re staying at your place, Lou.” 

A few minutes later, they were bundled together in the back of a cab, on their way to Louis’ apartment for movies, more wine, and falling asleep on the couch.

●●●

On the Saturday after his birthday, Harry stumbled out of his bedroom to an empty apartment, fresh coffee in the kitchen, and a box of his favorite almond croissants on the counter. A note was taped to the top of the bakery box. Liam had set everything up and left to spend the day with Niall, since Louis had asked him to keep his day free. 

After a leisurely breakfast and bath, Harry dressed comfortably and warmly, as per Louis’ instructions, and headed out to meet him at Rockefeller Center around noon. 

When Harry stepped out of the taxi, Louis was waiting, leaning his shoulder against a lamppost, smiling and squinting his eyes against the sunlight. 

“You have sunglasses on top of your head, you know.” Harry reached up and tapped them.

“Yeah, well, I wanted to be sure you saw me.”

“What? Like I wouldn’t recognize you in sunglasses?”

Louis shrugged and slipped his sunglasses down to cover his eyes. “Maybe.”

“Lou, I’d know you anywhere. Probably even dressed as… I don’t know… Mr. Met.”

The grin on Louis’ face got impossibly wider and he elbowed Harry before changing the subject. “You want to go to a game this season?”

“No.” Harry answered quickly, but at Louis’ disappointed expression, he changed his mind. “Okay. If you buy me a footlong and a beer. Two beers.”

“Fine.” Back to smiling, the way it should be, Louis said, “Happy birthday week, by the way. I know I told you on Wednesday, but we’ve both been so busy lately.”

“What are… are we ice skating?”

“Yeah, I made reservations like, I don’t know… after Thanksgiving sometime. Remember the day we were out shopping and you saw those ice skates in your favorite thrift store? You said you always want to come here, just to say you’d done it, but you never remember to make reservations and it’s too crowded or it’s booked solid by the time you think of it.”

Harry surged forward, wrapped Louis up in a tight hug, and rocked him back and forth. “You’re the best, Lou. Thank you so much.” Harry pulled back, smiling so wide that his eyes were half-closed, and placed a wet, smacking kiss on Louis’ forehead. 

Louis poked a finger into one of Harry’s dimples and said, “You’re welcome. Now, let’s go skate. We’ve got lunch reservations after.”

They laced up their skates and made their way towards the ice, Harry’s grip tight on Louis’ arm as they stumbled a bit, but once he set foot on the ice, he was at home. He’d grown up skating and it was like riding a bike, it only took one trip around the rink for him to feel like he’d never stopped skating, even though it had been years. Harry sped closer to the entrance to the rink to find Louis still standing there, just off the ice.

“What are you doing? Come on.” He reached for Louis’ hand and tugged him onto the ice, steadying him with both hands on Louis’ hips when he crashed into Harry’s chest. “Don’t you know how to skate?”

Louis chewed on his bottom lip and shook his head. “But to be fair, I didn’t think you did either. You’re like Bambi on ice when you’re walking in shoes on the sidewalk. How was I supposed to know you’d turn into fucking… Michelle Kwan or whoever.”

“Alright, well, you’ll learn. I’ll teach you. Just… okay, it’s been years, but…hold on to my arms.” They gripped each other by the elbows and Harry slowly started to skate backwards, pulling Louis along.

“Can’t believe you’re skating fucking backwards.” Louis grumbled and scrunched up his nose. “Thought we’d both fall down a few times, then head off to the bar to start drinking.”

“It’s early for that, Lou.” Harry chastised him, then pouted a little. “Thought you said I had to clear the whole day for you. If we’re just drinking, we can do that at home.”

“Yeah, well, I thought I’d need a drink by the time we finished. But there’s more than just this. I did plan the whole day. But,” He kept going, stopping Harry from interrupting with a look. “It’s all secret.”

By the time they’d finished skating, Harry had fallen twice and Louis had fallen so many times that Harry had stopped counting. After putting their own shoes back on, they headed inside for lunch—burgers and fries from one of the more casual restaurants—and before Harry could order a second beer, Louis was dragging him off to the next thing. 

Which turned out to be the late afternoon showing of _Le Feu Follet_ at The Paris Theatre. Harry knew he looked like a tourist, knew his eyes were probably bugging out of his head, knew that his dimples probably looked like giant craters in his cheeks, but he didn’t care. This was his number one tourist _thing_ that he’d always wanted to do, but never had the nerve to do on his own and never wanted to ask a date to do with him. He didn’t even care what the movie was about, it was the experience that mattered. 

Two hours later, they were standing on the sidewalk, wondering where they’d gone wrong. With a sigh, Harry rubbed his eyes, trying to adjust to real life again. “That was the most depressing thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life.”

“Yeah… I…” Louis stood with both hands clasped behind his head, his hair was messy where he’d been tugging on it during the film, his eyes were shiny and maybe a little red. He dropped his hands to his sides and looked away, miserable. “Sorry.”

“No, Lou.” Harry poked him in the stomach, trying to make him smile. “No, so listen. It was super depressing, but I’m still glad we came here. I’ve been wanting to for eleven years. Eleven years. And you made it happen. So now I know. I know what it’s like to sit through a depressing French film with subtitles.” Harry wasn’t going to let this ruin their day. Louis’ day, because even though he was doing this for Harry, it was Louis’ plan, and Harry wanted him to feel like it had been a success. “I don’t have to wonder anymore, right?”

“I guess.” Louis squinted at him, seeming unsure whether to believe Harry or not, but then he smiled. A small smile, for sure, not one of his big grins that Harry loved so much, but a smile nonetheless. “There’s, um, there’s more. If you want.”

“More what?” It was dark, almost seven o’clock, so maybe they were going to dinner. They’d had a late lunch though, so Harry wasn’t very hungry, he hoped that Louis wouldn’t be offended if he couldn’t eat very much. 

“More of the day. I have plans, remember?” Louis looked determined now, his brief dismay over the movie had passed, and he seemed more like his regular self. Harry smiled as Louis pulled his beanie low over his ears, then tugged on Harry’s elbow, walking him past The Plaza, toward the park, their arms looped together and their steps in sync. 

They stood on the corner of East 59th by the park, but Louis held tight to Harry’s elbow when he tried to keep walking. He pulled Harry back and turned him to face him, smiling like… well, the sun. And Harry couldn’t help but smile back, big and wide, dimples and teeth, and laugh a little before he asked, “What?”

“Your chariot awaits, Harold.” Louis did a fancy bow, beanie in his hand held out toward the street.

“What?” Harry felt like he’d said that word a hundred times today, but the answer to his question arrived in the form of a horse-drawn carriage. “Are we going for a carriage ride?” Harry couldn’t control his voice, he knew it was high pitched and squeaky, knew that he probably looked like he needed to visit the restroom with his bouncing from foot to foot, but today was like a dream and he was just so thrilled to do all of these things that he’d always wanted to do in the city. And the bonus of doing them with his favorite person, well… “You’re my favorite person, Lou. Thank you so much.” 

They climbed up and settled in, arms and sides pressed together in the seat, as they waited for the carriage to roll. Louis shivered at Harry’s side, so Harry slung his arm around behind him and pulled him close. “You need a better coat, Lou. Where’s your heavy one?”

“Home. I wanted to… I needed to wear this one. It looks nicer. I’m fine. You’re like a fucking furnace, so I’ll just leech your body heat, if you don’t mind.”

“Of course I don’t mind.” But Harry still unwrapped his scarf and wound it around Louis’ neck. 

They rode around the park for more than an hour, and they saw _everything._ Harry gasped every time they passed something else, as if he’d never seen the carousel, the fountain, or Strawberry Fields. But he hadn’t seen them at night, he said, and Louis agreed that there was something special about it, seeing the normal, everyday things in the moonlight changed them. Harry looked next to him and Louis was there, smiling still, watching him like he was waiting for something. The carriage drew to a halt in front of The Plaza where they’d started and once they’d climbed down onto the sidewalk, the driver had tipped his hat and driven away.

The day had been a long one, filled as it was, and it seemed like it was later than it actually was. Harry reached into his coat pocket for his phone to check the time. “Oh, it’s just after eight, Lou. I thought it was later.” Harry fiddled with his phone, an older Sony model with the numbers and letters on the buttons worn off, and slipped it back into his pocket. “Do you want to go get dinner? Pizza? We could take it back to my place and watch _Casablanca_.” Harry hadn’t stopped smiling all day, in fact, his face was a little bit sore from it. Louis wasn’t looking at him and hadn’t answered him about the pizza, so Harry reached out and flicked his ear. 

“Ouch. Asshole.” Louis rubbed his ear and pursed his lips. “No, I don’t want to go eat pizza on your stupid couch.”

“Oh.” Harry was a bit taken aback. Louis was annoying a lot of the time and obnoxious some of the time, but he wasn’t usually mean, at least not to Harry. Plus, he loved Harry’s couch. He slept on it enough.

“What time did you say it was?” Louis still wasn’t looking at him and Harry wanted to know what had gone wrong. They’d had such a lovely day. Maybe he hadn’t seemed appreciative enough.

“Quarter after.” Harry took a deep breath. He'd just apologize and thank him again, then maybe everything would be fine. He really didn’t want to fight with Louis today, after all of the lovely things he’d done. The temperature was dropping and Harry pulled his coat tight around him with his gloved hands in his pockets. 

Louis cleared his throat and finally looked at Harry. His cheeks were pink from the cold and he looked like he could really use a heavier coat. Louis licked his bottom lip, then bit down on it, his eyes searched Harry’s face for a few seconds, then he muttered, “Just thinking I might’ve gone a little overboard today. Um, we’re a few minutes early, but I’m sure they’re probably ready for us now.” He stepped closer to Harry and linked their arms, then led him down the sidewalk again. Harry found himself wanting to apologize, though he still wasn’t quite sure what for, he was wording and rewording it in his head when Louis stopped at the entrance to The Plaza.

There was no other word for it, Harry was in shock. Drinks at The Oak Bar. Harry felt underdressed, even though Louis assured him he was fine. This was the stuff of movies, literally. He kept having to remind himself to close his mouth because it kept dropping open every time he looked in a different direction. He reached out and grasped Louis’ upper arm, squeezing possibly too hard, but he couldn’t help it, he was overwhelmed. “Lou, this is amazing. I… I’ve wanted to come here for drinks since the first time I watched _North by Northwest.”_ Harry took a quick sip of his Manhattan and set it back on the bar, his hand was too shaky to keep hold of it. “Thank you so much for today. It’s been just incredible. Best birthday week of my life, honestly.”

“Yeah, about that.” Louis looked up at the ceiling and sighed. “This is sort of what I meant when I said I might’ve gone overboard. I, um, well… it’s not just drinks. We have dinner reservations in The Oak Room and… hush, please. I booked a room too.”

Harry’s eyebrows shot up. A room? Why? A kaleidoscope of butterflies fluttered in his stomach as he asked, “Lou, what’s going on?”

“It’s nothing. I swear. I was just… I talked to Liam and asked him if there was anything else I was missing, you know. I listed all the stuff you’d mentioned that you wanted to do in the city, and he… well, he was probably joking, now that I think about it. But I was just excited to check everything off your list.”

“You’re a crazy person. A room at The Plaza is… Louis, today must have cost you a fortune.” Harry leaned closer and whispered. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Shut up. I just wanted you to have a good day. You’ve had some shitty ones lately. And so have I. We’ve had fun, right?”

Harry nodded while trying to mentally tally up the cost of everything they’d done. 

“Okay, so we’ll stay here. It’s a double room. We’ll drink too much with dinner and go upstairs and pass out on fancy Plaza beds and order fancy Plaza room service breakfast tomorrow, then you can start planning what you’re doing for my birthday.”

“Very funny. Alright. But seriously, Lou. Thank you so much for today.”

“Shit. Okay. One more thing.” Louis reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small box and placed it on the bar in front of Harry. It was beautifully wrapped, which meant that Louis had it gift wrapped somewhere. Harry didn’t want to touch it. Louis nudged him with his elbow and Harry began to carefully untie the ribbon. He folded back the paper and opened the box, speechless when he saw what was inside. “You need it. It’s for work. I’m sick and tired of your piece of shit phone not working half the time.”

“It’s a Blackberry, Lou. This is too much. Literally. The line of almost too much was the hotel room. This is over the line. I… I can’t accept this.”

“You can and you will. Liam and Niall went in on it too. They hate your stupid phone as much as I do.”

Tears welled up in his eyes and Harry felt stupid. Crying over a phone. But it wasn’t the phone, not really, it was the whole day. Everything. His entire list of “Things I’d Like To Do In The City But Never Will” was checked off. He threw himself at Louis, stumbled off the barstool and gathered him in a tight hug, crying on his shoulder like a baby. Through his tears, he managed to say, “You’re the best, Lou. Love you so much. Can’t believe you’re my best friend.” He squeezed Louis impossibly tighter, almost toppling him off of his stool, then let go and sat back down. “Thank you,” he whispered, but it didn’t seem like enough. Louis was right, Harry was already thinking of things to do for Louis’ birthday in December.

Too much food and too much booze and a few hours later they were tripping over each other on their way out of the elevator. It took them a good ten minutes to find their room and when they did, they turned right back around and walked into the hallway. Harry backed against the wall and slid down until he was sitting on the floor, long legs splayed across the carpet. 

“Lou. Lou. Louis.” Harry stared at him, or he tried to. It was hard to focus and he felt a bit panicked underneath all of the alcohol, as he tried and failed to keep his voice calm, “There’s only one bed in there. You said it was a double.”

“I know.” Louis’ whisper was loud, and probably not a real whisper. “What do we do?”

“I don’t know. Should we stay out here?” Harry gestured all around himself at the hallway.

“No. No.” Louis shook his head and steadied himself against the door jamb. “Just… um… sleep. We’ll sleep.” He stopped and pointed at Harry. “Don’t drool on me though.”

“Shut up. Sleep. Okay.” Harry reached up and flapped his hands around until Louis managed to grab hold of them and pull him to his feet. They kicked off shoes and clothes in every direction and eventually, somehow, made it across the room without either of them falling down, though Louis did bump into a lamp and knock it over. Harry slapped both of his hands over his mouth when he barked a laugh so loud that he startled himself. 

While Louis was kneeling on the floor picking up the lamp, Harry took a running jump and landed on his stomach, starfished across the bed. 

The next thing Harry knew, he was being shaken awake, still in his underwear, still sprawled across the bed, feeling like absolute shit. The sunlight was streaming through the open curtains, making Harry’s eyes burn.

“Harry wake up. Wake up.” Louis’ voice was rough and scratchy. “We slept through breakfast and we have to check out.” 

“Oh god, Lou, stop. Stop shaking me or I’ll be sick.”

“Get up then. We have to go. You’re not the one who fell asleep on the floor.” Louis shook him one more time for good measure. “There’s toothbrushes and stuff in the bathroom, but we don’t have time to shower. Get dressed. Come on.”

Harry struggled against the churning in his stomach and forced himself up and into the bathroom, where he made it to the toilet just in time. Ten minutes later, they were in the elevator on the way down to the lobby to check out. Five minutes after that, they were in a cab on the way to their respective apartments so that they could sleep off the rest of their hangovers.

Best Birthday Ever. 

●●●

“Ugh. I’m going to be so lonely.” Harry had been whining nonstop all day. He knew it, but he didn’t care. He was losing his best friend and roommate. That stupid apartment was going to feel so empty now. “What are you doing? I thought we agreed on a plant.”

The bell above the door rang as Louis pulled it open and ducked inside, so it was either follow him or go on by himself. Harry followed Louis, of course, into The Sharper Image of all places. What Louis thought they might buy for Liam and Niall’s housewarming gift, Harry had no idea. A plant was a good idea. A battery-operated headlamp was not. Harry snatched it off of Louis’ head and put it back on the shelf, then left him alone to look at the gadgets, and wandered off towards the home goods section. Maybe they should buy them an air purifier.

Harry was comparing prices on air purifiers when he heard Louis’ amplified voice calling his name. 

“Harry, look. It’s a karaoke machine. We have to get this for them. It’s perfect.” Louis was visibly excited and it was easy to feed off of his mood. He handed Harry one of the microphones and turned to mess with the machine. The music started up and Louis handed Harry a lyric sheet, though he didn’t need it. He knew every word to this song, but he let Louis start it off.

“Ready? Here we go… _You are my fire, the one desire, believe when I say, I want it that way._ Now you go, Harry.” 

Even though Harry didn’t usually sing, at least not where other people could hear him, he couldn’t let Louis down. He started out tentatively, his voice wobbly and unsure. _“But we... are two worlds apart, can’t reach to your heart... when you say that I want it that way.”_ Harry found his stride. He loved the next part, so he belted it out as Louis joined in. _“Tell me why-eee, ain’t nothin’ but a heartache, tell me why-eee—”_

Louis had gone silent, so Harry stopped to ask why. He didn’t even realize he was still speaking into the microphone. “What? Is it my voice? I know. Joe always hated it. I’m a horrible singer, I’m—” 

“Christopher,” Louis muttered.

“Christopher? What? Where—” Harry’s voice boomed out through the speakers and Louis grabbed the microphone out of Harry’s hand and pointed. And there he was. Christopher. With someone else, probably the guy he’d cheated on Louis with and left him for. Harry was torn. Part of him wanted to grab Louis and run, but the other part wanted to punch the guy in the face, and the conflicting desires were enough to freeze Harry right where he stood.

The condescending smile on Christopher’s face was nothing compared to his tone when he sauntered over and spoke. “Hello, Louis. How are you?” As if Louis were ill or worse, still pining for him. 

“Fine. I’m fine.” Louis tapped the two microphones in his hands together causing a screech of feedback through the speaker, so Harry gently removed them from his grip and set them on the table. “How are you, Chris?”

“Wonderful, thank you. This is Harrison Garner, he’s a lawyer. Harrison, this is Louis Tomlinson.” Christopher actually gestured between them as if they should shake hands, but Louis stuffed his hands into his pockets instead. They stood there for a few seconds, uncomfortable silence heavy in the air, and then Christopher started looking back and forth from Louis to Harry.

“Oh, Christopher Glass, this is Harry Styles. Harry, this is Chris. Christopher.”

Harry nodded, but didn’t extend his hand. He was incredibly uncomfortable and he could feel the anxiety radiating off of Louis by his side. Without realizing it, Harry had stepped closer to Louis and rested his palm on Louis’ lower back to calm him. He wasn’t even aware that Christopher and Harrison were saying their goodbyes until they turned to walk away. 

“He looked weird.” Louis turned to Harry, and Harry’s hand slipped off of his back. “Don’t you think? He looked… I don’t know. Weird. Maybe he’s losing his hair.”

“I don’t… I don’t know, Lou, that's the first time I’ve seen him.”

The urge to comfort Louis was almost overpowering. Harry wanted to take him home and feed him and wrap him up in a blanket on his couch and force him to watch old movies for the rest of the day, but they had things to do, so Harry started flipping through the karaoke machine booklet to find the price.

Louis took the booklet from Harry’s hands and dropped it back on the table. “Let’s go get a plant.”

If Harry was asked to describe Louis in one word, that word would probably be _loud._ But for the last half hour of so, ever since the run-in with Christopher, he’d been uncharacteristically quiet. So Harry filled the silence by talking about plants. As they wandered around the nursery, Harry rambled on about traditional housewarming gifts like bread, salt, and candles, while looking for the perfect plant for Liam and Niall and keeping one eye on Louis and the frown that hadn’t left his face.

The frown was still there when they arrived at Niall and Liam’s new apartment, easy-to-care-for succulent plants in tow. Apparently, they’d arrived in the middle of a heated discussion about a coffee table, so Harry left the plants on the kitchen counter and tried to distract Louis with a beer. It was no use though, he was drawn into the living room by the ever increasing volume of their friends’ voices.

“It’s just ugly, Niall. It really is,” Liam explained. “Sweetie, It doesn’t go with any of the rest of the stuff in our living room.”

Niall countered, “You mean it doesn’t go with any of your stuff. Because you picked out all of this stuff. Not me. I just want this one thing.”

Harry and Louis stood by the kitchen table, waiting for their friends to notice them, and possibly stop fighting in front of them. No such luck. Liam called out brightly, “Harry! Harry, tell him. This is ugly, right?”

Harry didn’t know what to say. Yes, it was ugly. Quite possibly the ugliest piece of furniture he’d ever seen, but he didn’t want to be the one to say so. “It’s, um, it’s not my style, really.”

Niall turned to Louis for help. “Louis, come on. You like my table, don’t you?”

Louis had moved over to stand by the window and was leaning his forehead against the glass. He turned around and said, “Yeah,” then turned back to the window. 

Harry ignored the continued bickering behind him and walked over to stand next to Louis, who had apparently not missed a word of the argument, because he spun around and interrupted, “Hey, you know… we did this too, Chris and I. We moved in and we bickered about rugs and chose lamps and end tables. We discussed where to hang mirrors and artwork. And you know what happens?” The volume of Louis’ voice increased with each word. By the time he finished, he was yelling, gesturing wildly with both arms, eyes wide and almost panicked looking. “A few years down the road, you break up and you find yourself singing Backstreet Boys karaoke in front of Harrison.” Louis turned and walked back toward the window.

Harry went into panic and fix-it mode. He leaned close to Louis and whispered with a strained smile, “Do we need to do this right now? Is this really the best time?”

“Yes. Yes. I think this is the perfect time. If we can prevent this kind of… of heartache down the road for our friends. Yes.” Louis strode over to where Liam and Niall were standing by the coffee table, arms around each other, concern plain on their faces. “You guys, listen. Right now everything is so great, so wonderful. You’re so in love. It’s just… It’s lovely, really.” Louis smiled, but Harry knew that smile and braced himself for what was coming next. “You need to know though, you have to know what’s next. Because sooner or later…” Louis reached into the nearest box that had yet to be unpacked and pulled out a plate. “Sooner or later, you’re going to be screaming at each other over who gets to keep this. This eight dollar dish.” 

Louis was yelling again and Harry tried to stop him from continuing, but Louis held his hands up, lowered his voice back to a normal tone, and talked over Harry. “Niall, Liam. Please, do me a favor. Make sure you write your names inside all of your own books and label your CDs. Do it now before they end up mixed up on these bookshelves. Because believe it or not, one day you guys are going to have a knock-down, drag-out fight over who gets to keep this coffee table.” He’d kept his voice mostly in check, but he lost it then, pointing and yelling, “This stupid, fucking, ugly, coffee table!” 

Which was enough for Niall to finally speak up. “I thought you said you liked it.” 

“I was being nice!” Louis’ voice was shrill and Harry chewed his nails as Louis stomped off, disappeared down the hall, and slammed the door to the apartment behind him.

Harry ran his fingers through his long hair and twisted it around his fingers. “I’m sorry, guys. He just bumped into Christopher. I think for the first time since they broke up.”

Liam nodded and Niall squeezed his shoulder, pulling him into a hug. They started whispering to each other, so Harry took the opportunity to go check on Louis. Beside the steps to the building, there was a short brick wall with a planter behind it. Harry found Louis out there, sitting on the wall, head hanging down, feet dangling and swinging back and forth, his hands gripped the edges of the brick on either side of his body, and his knuckles were white with strain. As Harry took the last step down, Louis looked up at him, and Harry had to pause to take it all in. His face was pink, but not the way that Harry liked to see it when he was happily flushed from laughing, the muscles in his jaw moved as he clenched his teeth and, if Harry wasn’t seeing things, his eyes were wet, as if he’d been doing everything in his power not to let the tears fall. While Harry watched, Louis sighed heavily, and dropped his head back down. 

“I know. I know I shouldn’t have said all that.” Louis muttered. At least he was quiet again.

There was just enough space for Harry to sit next to him on the wall, so he did, and gently rubbed his hand down Louis’ back. “Lou, you need to… you have to stop doing things like that. Just saying every little thing you think of as soon as you think it.”

Louis hopped down from the wall as Harry talked and stood on the sidewalk with his hands on his hips and sneered, “Really?”

“Yes, really.” Harry refused to let Louis out of this conversation. While he tried to reel in the lecturing tone he knew he’d taken at first, he held his voice steady and kept his eyes on Louis’ face. “It’s just… there are times and places for things.” 

“How about this?” Louis’ voice was thunderous, apparently Harry hadn’t managed to control his tone as well as he’d thought. “The next time you’re giving a lecture on proper social graces, let me know so I can sign up.” He turned and started to storm off. 

It was completely uncalled for. Harry hadn’t done anything to deserve to be on the receiving end of Louis’ nastiness today. Before Louis could get too far, Harry caught up to him, grabbed his elbow and spun him around. “Hey. You don’t get to take your anger out on me, Lou. That’s not fair.”

“Oh, no. I totally get to take some of this out on you.” Louis stepped closer, pointing a finger at Harry’s chest. “You don’t get to sit here and tell me how to _behave._ I’m not your child. So, yeah, I get to be mad at you, especially when you’re… I’m basically being told how to live my life by... by Mr. Hospital-Corners.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What’s that supposed to mean? It means that nothing bothers you.” Louis stretched his arms wide and raised his voice. “You never get upset about anything.”

“Don't be ridiculous.” Harry frowned and spun on his heel, he needed to cool down. 

No chance of that when Louis just followed right behind him, still ranting. “What? It’s true. You never get upset about Joe. It’s like…”

Harry whipped back around. “What? What’s it like?”

“It’s like… you guys broke up and you were bothered by it for like five minutes, then you were over it. It never comes up. You’re never upset about it. It never… it never just backs up on you. How is that even possible? You know it’s normal to like… grieve over the end of a long-term relationship? You had a five year relationship, it ended, and you… it’s like it didn’t affect you at all. Do you not feel any sense of loss?”

“Fuck off, Louis. I don’t have to listen to this shit from you.” Harry stalked past him and headed up the stairs to go back inside. Louis could stew in his anger alone, Harry wasn’t going to sit there and take this from him.

But Louis followed, of course he did, his voice demanding that Harry turn around. “If you’re so over Joe, how come you’re not moving on? Why aren’t you seeing anyone?”

“I see people.” 

“Sure, yeah, you see people. Have you slept with one person since you and Joe broke up?”

“What? What the hell does that have to do with anything? If I slept with someone, that would prove I was over Joe? All I have to do is fuck somebody and boom, that’s it? Louis, you’re going to have to move out of the city because you’ve fucked everybody in New York and that doesn’t seem to have done anything to help you get over Christopher. And I will have sex with somebody when it is making love, not the way you do it, like you’re out for revenge or something.” Harry’s chest heaved as he tried to breathe. 

“Are you finished?” Louis whispered.

Harry nodded once and crossed his arms in front of his chest.

“Can I say something?”

Harry nodded again.

Louis opened his arms and stepped forward, closed the distance between them, and wrapped Harry up in a hug as he whispered into his ear, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Harry sagged against him, all of the tension left his body, he tucked his face into Louis’ neck and held on tight as they rocked back and forth muttering apologies to each other. 

They needed to go back inside to help Niall and Liam, so Harry pulled back and took Louis’ hand, leading him back up the steps. As Harry reached for the door to let them back inside the building, Niall came barrelling through sideways, struggling with the ugly coffee table. Louis and Harry stepped out of his way to let him by, and watched him carry it down the steps.

Niall grunted as he passed them, then turned to Louis and snapped, “Don’t say a fucking word.”

●●●

The hubbub made it almost impossible to tell who was saying what and whether anyone was guessing the right words. Harry shushed everyone and turned back to the dry erase board on the easel next to him. 

“Fork.”

“Plate.”

“Water.”

“Sink.”

“Soap.”

“Bubbles.”

“Wash.”

Finally. Harry started tapping on the drawings of the fork and plate then over to the drawing of a stick person with soap bubbles. Back and forth. Someone had to get it, it was so easy. They’d practically said it already. He needed to win, he always won at Pictionary, plus he kind of wanted to show off for Jeremy. But his team was awful.

Niall was shouting again, “Fork washer! Plate washer!” Over and over and Harry thought he might lose his mind. The timer beeped and Harry dramatically fell to the floor, arms and legs flailing.

Louis cackled and yelled over everyone, “Dishwasher!”

From his place on the floor, Harry raised one arm, then one finger. “I knew you’d get it, Lou.”

“Yeah, well, what the fuck is a fork washer?” Louis elbowed Niall and fell into a fit of laughter. 

Across the room Jeremy called out the final score. They’d lost. And it was time for dessert. 

Louis’ new boyfriend Daniel had brought an assorted box of cupcakes from the hottest new bakery in town, where he apparently worked as a baker. Harry loved their almond croissants and would probably frequent the shop more if it were closer to his apartment. Harry rolled over onto his stomach and pushed himself to standing, asking each person in turn if they’d like coffee with dessert, then followed Liam into the kitchen to help while everyone else cleaned up the game and gathered back around the dining room table. He tried not to watch as Louis and Daniel stood in the corner, face to face, whispering to each other. It made him strangely uncomfortable. When Louis leaned in to kiss him, Harry turned away.

Alone in the kitchen with Liam, Harry felt like he could finally relax. It was stressful being around all of these people when he was essentially on a date. They’d been seeing each other for just over a month and Harry was happy with Jeremy, mostly. They had fun together, and they’d progressed from playful kisses, to heavy make out sessions on the couch, to trading blow jobs. Harry hadn’t moved things to the bedroom yet. It was going… well, he supposed.

Liam had a stack of dessert plates on the counter and a handful of forks. “Harry, do you think we need forks for cupcakes?”

“No.” Harry answered as he poured the coffee. He carefully placed each cup on the tray and turned to make sure no one had joined them in the kitchen before quietly asking, “Don’t you think Daniel is a little young for Louis?”

“I mean, he’s young, but look what he’s done.”

“What’s he done?”

“What do you mean? You love his croissants. Look at these cupcakes.”

“You mean Daniel owns the bakery? I thought he just worked there.” Harry was truly surprised, but then he thought of something. “Louis doesn’t even like sweets.”

Liam handed a little container of cream and one of sugar to Harry to place on the tray of coffee. Harry picked up the tray and waited for Liam to lead the way out of the kitchen with the tray of cupcakes.

Liam held the door open with his bum and smiled. “Harry, I like Jeremy. He’s really great.”

“I know.” Harry agreed as he walked towards the kitchen door. “He’s a grown up.” 

A few weeks later Louis and Harry were both single again. 

●●●

It was close to midnight on Sunday and Harry had already stayed up past his bedtime cleaning up the room that had once been Liam’s, setting up his desk and bookshelves in there, and making a list of things to buy for his new guest room. Number one, a bed. Or a sofa bed. Or a futon. Or a daybed. He’d just stepped out of the shower when his phone rang and, thinking it was an emergency, he answered. 

Ten minutes later he hung up and promptly burst into tears. As soon as he was able to calm himself down enough, he called Louis.

Louis answered on the first ring. “Hello?”

“Are you alone?” Harry hated that he had to ask that, but with Louis, he never knew for sure.

“Yeah, I was just reading that copy of _Sorcerer's Stone_ that you gave me.”

“Can you… could you come over?”

“Why? What’s up?”

“He’s getting married.”

“Who?”

Harry sobbed. “Joe.” 

“I’ll be right there.”

Harry moved to the couch to wait for Louis and jumped up as soon as he heard him knock. When Harry opened the door, Louis immediately stepped inside, wrapped his arms around him and held him while Harry cried on his shoulder. 

Harry took a step back and with a shuddering breath tried to speak, “Th-thanks for coming over. I-I’m sorry for calling so late.” He wiped his nose with the tissue in his hand and realized that it was really too far gone to still be used. “I need a Kleenex.”

Louis was in the middle of taking off his coat, so he shrugged it off and tossed it on the couch to follow Harry down the hall to his bedroom. While Harry talked, Louis sat on the edge of the bed, nodding along and listening.

“He called to see how I was doing. It’s been over a year and now he calls? Anyway… where are the goddamn Kleenex?” Harry spun around, eyes searching over all of the surfaces of his room. Louis held up the box, apparently it had been buried in the blankets on the bed.

Harry snatched a tissue from the box and wiped his eyes, then tossed it behind him onto the floor. He sniffed and continued, “He was going on and on about work, about how busy he was, about his assistant being out of town, and I was listening and thinking, _wow, I really am over him._ Because it was like… nothing. I didn’t care. I can’t believe I was ever remotely interested in anything he had to say.” Harry grabbed another Kleenex and blew his nose. He felt so ridiculous acting like this in front of Louis, but he couldn’t stop now. “And then Joe said he had some news… The guy works in his office. He’s someone else’s assistant. He just met him. This guy is supposed to be Joe’s rebound. His transitional person. He’s not supposed to be the one.”

Louis gestured for Harry to come sit down next to him on the edge of the bed, and when Harry did, Louis draped his arm around Harry’s back and pulled him close, leaning over to place a kiss on the top of his head. “I’m sorry, Harry.”

“It’s just… all this time I’ve been saying that he didn’t want what I wanted. He didn’t want to get married and have kids. But the truth is… The truth is…” Harry couldn’t hold it in any longer, he sobbed out the last few words, “He didn’t want those things with me.” Harry choked out another sob, then sniffled and wiped his tears away with a new tissue and whispered, “He didn’t love me.”

They sat quietly for a few seconds, Louis’ hand lightly tracing circles on Harry’s back. In the middle of all of the emotional upheaval, Harry had forgotten that he was only wearing his underwear. He sniffed again, trying to bring his tears under control.

Louis gently hooked a finger under Harry’s chin and forced his face up so that they were looking each other in the eye. “Harry, if you could take Joe back right now, would you?”

Offended at the very thought, Harry quickly answered, “No.” Then flopped back onto his bed and choked out, “But why didn’t he want all that with me? Why didn’t he want to marry me? What’s—” Harry sobbed, “What’s wrong with me?”

“Nothing. Nothing’s wrong with you.” Louis’ words were soothing as he brushed Harry’s curls off of his forehead.

“I’m difficult.” 

“You’re challenging.”

“I’m too… I’m too high-maintenance.”

“But in a good way. I like you like that.”

Harry sat back up, still crying, and trying to talk through his tears. “No, I drove him away. And I’m gonna be _forty.”_

“What? When?”

Harry blew his nose again and wailed, “Someday.”

“In eight years, Harry.”

“Yeah, but it’s there. It’s there and I’m going to be old and alone. Like what you said about dying along with cats. Only I don’t even have cats.”

“Nah, you won’t be alone. You’ll have me, won’t you?”

Harry laughed, because of course he’d have Louis. But eventually Louis would have someone, a boyfriend or a husband and he’d slowly drift away from Harry. And that set Harry off again. He was sobbing and snot was running out of his nose and his Kleenex couldn’t keep up. Louis grabbed him and pulled him closer, until Harry’s face was pressed against his sweater. It was so embarrassing, sitting there in his underwear, crying and, god, getting snot all over Louis’ sweater. Harry tried to pull away, but Louis held tight, rubbing his back and whispering over and over that it would be alright. After a minute or so, Louis quietly offered to get Harry something to drink.

“No, Lou, just… can you just hold me for a little while longer?”

“Sure.” Louis tipped his head down and kissed Harry’s cheek, the one that wasn’t plastered to the shoulder of his sweater. Then he gently placed a kiss on Harry’s temple, and his forehead. Harry sat up. They were wound together, arms around each other, faces just a few inches apart. Harry could see the flecks of green in Louis’ brilliant blue eyes and leaned in closer to look at them. 

Their noses bumped and suddenly they were kissing. Tentatively at first, soft, careful kisses, then a heat rose inside Harry and something clicked into place. This. This was what he wanted. He pushed forward, opening his mouth as Louis opened his, and yes. His face was wet with tears and he still hadn’t caught his breath from crying, but he didn’t care. Louis’ hands were all over Harry’s back, roaming up and down causing chills to break out all over Harry’s body. And Harry needed more. He ran his hands under the hem of Louis’ sweater and pulled it up, trailing his fingers along the skin above the waistband of Louis’ jeans. Louis moaned into Harry’s mouth and Harry pulled him closer, still trying to pull his sweater off. He laughed and sat back a bit, blushing hard, and watched Louis undress. He’d never let himself look at Louis while he was undressed before, he’d always made sure to look away or avert his eyes, and now he wondered why. He was gorgeous. And naked. Harry jumped up and yanked his underwear down, then scooted backwards up the bed. 

Louis crawled over him, the hungry look in his eyes causing Harry to forget his earlier heartache. They kissed for what seemed like hours, then they made love. Harry knew it was silly, knew that Louis would give him a hard time about it if he said it out loud, but that’s what it was. Louis was gentle, yet demanding, caressing Harry like he knew precisely where to touch him to bring him the most pleasure. Touching every inch of Harry’s skin, kissing, teasing, licking, biting, and provoking sensations that Harry was sure he’d never experienced before. 

Louis coaxed whines and groans and shivers and gasps until Harry lost all track of time and it was as if everything around him floated away and all that was left was Louis’ mouth on his, their hot skin pressing together. The exquisite torture of being brought to the edge again and again, but never allowed to fall over. They shook and shuddered and moaned until they crashed against each other, slick with sweat and slippery with lube, and fell together, panting into each other’s mouths. 

They kissed as they eased their bodies apart, lips sliding over jaws and cheeks, until they lay tangled together, floating in the haze, but anchored by the touch of warm skin. Harry sighed and drifted off to sleep.

●●●

The airy material of Harry’s curtains didn’t do much to keep out the sunlight, which was a good thing most days, as it allowed him to wake up gently, usually before his alarm sounded. This morning, he awoke to Louis standing by the foot of the bed, buttoning his jeans.

Harry’s voice cracked as he quietly said, “Hey.” and pushed himself up to sit against the headboard. “What are you doing?”

“I—I’ve gotta go. I’ve got to go home and shower and change clothes because I’ve got to go to work. And so do you. It’s Monday.” Louis tilted his head and smiled, but Harry knew that smile, even though it had never been used on him before. It didn’t make Louis’ eyes crinkle at all. He could feel the crease when it appeared between his eyebrows, and even when Louis leaned over and rubbed it with his thumb, it didn’t disappear. “I’d like to take you to dinner tonight, if you’re free.”

Harry nodded and Louis pressed a kiss to the top of Harry’s head, pulled his sweater on, and was gone.

As soon as Harry heard the apartment door close, he called Liam. And before Liam could finish saying the word _hello,_ Harry was already talking. 

“Li, I… I’m sorry for calling so early.”

“Are you alright?”

“I think…” Harry sighed. “I did something I shouldn’t have.”

“What?”

“Louis came over last night… I was upset about Joe. Joe’s getting married, by the way. I was crying and just… I was really upset.”

“Oh, Harry, I’m sorry.”

“No, listen. That’s… We were talking and I was crying on his sweater and he was rubbing my back and the next thing I know, we’re kissing, and, well… we did it.”

Liam gasped, “That’s great, Harry. Niall and I have been saying for months that you guys should do it. You’re perfect for each other, you belong together. How was it?”

“Oh, Li… It was amazing. I—I’ve never… it’s never been like that before. Ever. But then… this morning, he was just… I don’t know. I felt like one of his dates. One of his one night stands. Like he’d been looking for a believable excuse to get out of here. He just disappeared.”

“That’s awful. Wow. I can’t believe him.”

Harry pulled his pillow down onto his face and mumbled, “I’m so embarrassed.”

“Harry. Listen, this is a shitty situation, but don’t be embarrassed. Do you want to come over for breakfast?”

“No. I feel awful. I think I might be coming down with a cold or something.”

“Are you going to work or do you feel sick enough to call out?” 

“Ugh. I’ll go to work. I’m… I can’t stay home and wallow. He wants to go to dinner tonight.”

“Really? Okay, well, call me later.”

“Yeah. Thanks, Li. Bye.”

Harry dropped his phone onto the mattress next to him and pulled the blanket over his head. If he stayed there, hidden completely from the world, maybe he wouldn’t have to deal with this shit. After a few minutes, it was too hot and all he could smell was his morning breath, so he threw the covers back and forced himself to get out of bed. It was still early, so he took his time showering, drying his hair, and picking out his clothes for work. If he was going to go straight to dinner afterward, he wanted to look nice. And not for Louis, for himself. As he straightened his tie in the mirror, he decided he’d just say it was a mistake, it was obvious from his behavior that Louis thought so. Harry only hoped that he got to say it first.

As he mentally rehearsed what to say to Louis, Harry’s disappointment grew. It seemed as if something important shifted as soon as they kissed, like his entire universe moved an inch to the left and everything suddenly fit together perfectly. It had felt so right and as he’d fallen asleep in Louis’ arms and he’d imagined doing that every night, what it would be like to come home to him after work every day, wake up with him every morning, have babies with him, grow old with him... 

Whatever he thought he’d felt had been… brought on by his emotional overreaction to Joe’s engagement. He’d been on edge, vulnerable, and at that thought anger welled up inside of him. Louis should have—No. They were equally at fault here. It was a mistake. They’d both made a mistake. 

The restaurant wasn’t one that they’d been to before, or at least Harry had never been there. They were seated by a window overlooking the city. It was a lovely view and Harry couldn’t help but feel that in another world, a parallel universe maybe, he would be sitting here happily waiting for the server to bring their salads while he and Louis held hands beside their wine glasses.

When the server placed their salads on the table and walked away, Harry readied himself. He needed to say it now, get it out, make it clear for them both. One sip of wine and he firmly stated, “It was a mistake.” For just an instant, Harry regretted saying it. Because he knew that, had Louis’ reaction been different, had he not rushed out and made it clear that he didn’t want Harry for more than a night, Harry would have… It didn’t matter. It was a mistake.

“Oh, I’m so glad you think so too.” Louis rushed out, clearly relieved. 

Yep. A mistake.

Louis continued, leaning over his salad, eyes wide and talking fast. “I’m not saying last night wasn’t great, because it was.”

Harry could feel his face start to heat up. “It was, um, it was great, yeah.” He reached for his water and took a sip and tried to figure out how to change the subject. The last thing he wanted to do was talk about it.

“It really was, um…” Louis seemed to lose his train of thought as he poked at his salad with his fork.

“We just never should have done it. It shouldn’t have happened.”

“I couldn’t agree more. I’m so glad you said that.”

“I’m so… relieved.” Harry forced a smile onto his face and dropped his hands to his lap where the shaking wouldn’t be obvious and he could twist his napkin without Louis noticing. But it didn’t matter because Louis wasn’t watching him, he’d picked up his fork and started in on his salad. It really didn’t mean anything to him at all. Harry swallowed a bite of salad around the lump in his throat and tried to hide his shudder when Louis looked up at him.

“I just love that we can do this, you know? Sit here in a comfortable silence.” Louis turned back to his salad and Harry watched on, suddenly not very hungry, even though he’d hardly eaten anything all day.

●●●

They hardly spoke over the next few days, each of them making excuses, at least that was what Harry was doing. Harry was _busy._ Work was crazy, he was redecorating his guest room, cleaning his bathtub, driving upstate with Gemma to pick apples. He became a master at thinking of lies on the spot and would occasionally be reminded of Louis just from that. 

There came a point when they had to face each other and that was the evening that they’d long ago planned to spend with Liam and Niall ironing out their responsibilities with regards to the wedding. Thankfully, it was nothing formal. They sat around the dining room table at Liam and Niall’s place drinking beer and eating pizza, while helping them finalize seating charts and menus and hotel rooms.

The work itself was easy. Sitting in the chair next to Louis, all four of them pretending that Louis and Harry hadn’t slept together, and hadn’t irrevocably changed something between them, was the difficult part. On the surface, everything seemed fine, but inside Harry felt like everyone was watching him, waiting for him to say or do something that would ruin the evening. 

Niall and Liam had gone to the kitchen for more beer and to get rid of the pizza boxes, though Harry suspected they wanted to force some one-on-one time between he and Louis. 

The label on Harry’s bottle of beer had one loose corner, so he picked at it, stared at it, and slowly peeled it back, all while studiously ignoring Louis’ presence. 

Until Louis whispered, “Are you mad at me?”

Harry took a deep breath in through his nose and blew it out through his mouth, then took a sip of beer before answering, “I’m not sure.”

“Wha—Why?” Louis actually sounded surprised. “We agreed it was a mistake.”

Harry kept his eyes on his beer while he talked. “It’s not that, Lou. It’s… I don’t know. You left. You treated me like… like one of your dates. You made your excuses and you took off.” 

“I did not.”

“Sure looked like it to me.”

“I had to go to work. We both did.”

“Louis.” Harry turned to look at him while he picked at the label on his beer. “How many times have you slept over on my couch, woken up and made coffee or gone to pick up breakfast, and either gone to work in the same clothes from the day before or gone in late?”

“I…” but there was nothing Louis could say because Harry was right. 

Niall and Liam must have figured they’d given Louis and Harry enough time alone, because they came back with more beer and Niall suggested they watch a movie. Before long, they were all four sitting on the long couch, Niall and Liam snuggled up on one end under a blanket, watching the latest installment of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. 

Harry wondered if Louis noticed it or if it was just him. They were side by side on the couch, thighs pressed together, and Harry knew that _before_ they would have been snuggled up, arms around each other, Louis’ head on Harry’s chest or Harry’s head on Louis’ shoulder. Instead, Harry sat stiffly, facing forward, back straight, afraid to move lest his efforts to get comfortable be read as some sort of attempt at… he wasn’t sure. It wasn’t as if he’d try to have sex with Louis on the couch. He rested his head back and unfocused his eyes. Maybe he could fall asleep.

An hour later and Harry was pretty sure that Louis wasn’t experiencing the same paralyzing paranoia that he was. Louis had pulled his legs up onto the couch, bending his knees and letting them fall to the side, right over Harry’s thigh. As the movie played on, Louis’ body relaxed into Harry’s more and more until his arm was resting on Harry’s leg, and his head was resting on Harry’s shoulder. It would have been fine, except Harry was in the middle of a complete inner freak out.

Because he realized he wanted more. He wanted to touch Louis, but not the way they used to touch. Possessive touches. Greedy touches. He wanted to touch Louis the way a lover would and that was not what they were. Harry’s mind reeled as he remained incredibly still, feeling the warmth of Louis’ body next to his, the heat of Louis’ arm where it rested on his thigh, the tickle of Louis’ hair on his neck every time he minutely shifted. Each sensation felt multiplied exponentially and Harry didn’t know how to handle it. 

When the movie ended, Harry practically leapt from his seat, sending Louis sprawling into his vacated spot. Harry stood facing away from the couch and stretched. It was late enough that he could make his excuses and leave.

With an exaggerated yawn, Harry covered his mouth and then quietly said, “I’m gonna head home, guys. Thanks for dinner and everything.” 

Liam had fallen asleep against Niall, so Harry waved his goodbye and went to grab his coat. He stood by the door, pulling on his hat and gloves, and wrapping his scarf around his neck, when Louis joined him and whispered, “I’ll walk with you or... you want to share a cab?”

“I was planning to walk. I… Yeah, alright.”

They walked onto the sidewalk and in the direction of Harry’s apartment in silence. Harry was still on edge from his panic at Louis touching him during the movie, so when Louis spoke, it startled him slightly.

“Hey, um. Earlier? What you said… You’re right.”

“Hmm?” 

“I shouldn’t have left. So I guess I’m trying to say I’m sorry for that. I should… I should’ve done like you said and acted normal.”

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah, apology accepted.”

“Good. I mean, thanks. I’d like us to get back to normal.” Louis sounded relieved. “Hey, let’s—” Louis stepped past Harry, closer to the street and flagged down a passing taxi. “Let’s take a cab. I’m tired.”

The ride was quiet and when Harry climbed out of the cab, they said goodbye, but didn’t make plans to get together anytime soon. Things were not back to normal, not even close.

●●●

It was late afternoon and Harry hadn’t eaten lunch yet because Liam had asked him to come along to the final fitting for his suit and it was taking forever. While Liam stood on the dais, Harry reclined on the small chaise lounge in the fitting room, sipping champagne and trying to offset his buzz by eating the complimentary almonds that were the only food available in the shop. 

“You look amazing, Li.” Harry sipped his champagne and figured he’d just ask. “Is, um, is Louis bringing anyone to the wedding?”

Liam turned to see his bum in the mirror. “Hmm? Oh, I don’t know. Massachusetts is kind of far to take someone you barely know.”

“Who?” Harry blurted out, but then collected himself to add, “I mean, is he seeing someone?”

As Liam button his jacket and smoothed the lapels, he watched Harry in the mirror. “Have you guys not… Are you fighting?”

“No.” Harry huffed a laugh. “We’d have to talk to each other to do that.”

“You guys are so dysfunctional. You should hang out. Nothing’s going to go back to normal between you two if you avoid each other.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

“Harry, when we were living together, you and Louis hung out all the time. You guys talked every single day. Don’t you miss him?”

“Of course I miss him. I just… I don’t want to be the one to make the effort.”

Liam stepped down from the dais and sat on the end of the chaise. “Something else is going on. Tell me. You guys aren’t going to ruin my wedding, are you?”

Gently, Harry tapped Liam’s back with his toe. He didn’t want to get his wedding suit dirty. “I may have figured something out recently. And that thing is that, well...” Harry lowered his voice to a whisper, “that I have feelings for Louis.”

Liam chuckled. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

“Shut up, Li. That’s not funny.”

“I’m not lying when I say that Niall and I have wanted you guys to get together. You guys obviously love each other—” Liam grabbed Harry’s champagne flute when he started choking. “You do. It may be platonic or, I don’t know, a different kind of love, but it’s there. You two care about each other and it’s obvious.”

“I don’t think it is to him, Li.”

“You might be right about that.” Liam handed Harry his champagne, stood up and walked back to the mirror.

“So, answer me. Is he seeing anyone?”

“He was, but I’m not sure if he still is. An anthropologist.”

Harry settled back against the chaise and sipped his champagne. “What’s he look like?”

“Um, blonde, built, maybe two inches taller than me. Your basic nightmare.” Liam unbuttoned his jacket and carefully slipped it off his shoulders. “It’s really unfair to be _that_ good looking and intelligent as well.”

Harry groaned and shoved a handful of almonds into his mouth. 

●●●

In the days leading up to the wedding, Harry picked up his phone to call Louis at least a dozen times, but never went through with it. He didn’t know quite what to say. _Let’s have lunch, I think I’m falling in love with you._ No matter how much Louis said he wanted things to be back to normal, they weren’t and probably would never be. And that was the problem. 

Not only had there been a fundamental shift in Harry’s relationship with his best friend, to the point where he didn’t think they could go back to the way things had been, but as Harry tried to move past it, he realized that he couldn’t. Somehow, over the last year, he’d managed to fall in love with Louis. He just hadn’t realized it until things were so beyond fucked up that they weren’t even on speaking terms. 

●●●

The flight to Boston was short and easy, Harry had managed to get a discounted first-class ticket, and had fit everything into his carry-on bag, so he wasn’t forced to sit near Louis on the plane and was allowed to disembark early. He was probably already in the cab to his hotel when the rest of the group made it off the plane. The ceremony was to take place in the Dome Room of the Lenox Hotel, where the wedding party and most of the guests were staying. It was a beautiful room and Harry was looking forward to the party afterwards, it was the rehearsal and the ceremony he was hesitant about. He and Louis were the only attendants. Niall had asked Louis to stand up for him, and of course, Liam had asked Harry. It would be the closest they’d been to each other since the cab ride home after they’d left Niall and Liam’s place.

For the rehearsal, Liam wore dark gray wool trousers with a simple white button-down shirt and a paisley tie in Niall’s favorite shades of green. He’d brought his clothes to Harry’s room so they could get ready together, or so he said. Harry suspected Liam had other motivations, especially when he started talking about Louis. While Harry pulled on his black slim-fit trousers and stood up to check his reflection in the mirror, Liam rambled on about Louis and how he seemed like he was really looking forward to hanging out with Harry this weekend. 

Harry’s hair had finally grown long enough to pull completely up, so he twisted it around into a bun and fastened it with a hair tie. His shirt was hanging in the bathroom where he’d hoped the steam from the shower would get the remaining wrinkles out. He slipped it on and buttoned it up. All black wasn’t typical wedding rehearsal attire, but it fit Harry’s mood. It was just supposed to be the four of them and the officiant at the rehearsal; Niall and Liam hadn’t wanted to force everyone to attend, and had made reservations for afterward in one of the hotel’s restaurants. 

There wasn’t much to the rehearsal. Louis and Harry were to enter from opposite sides of the room and stand in front the two windows, facing out into the room. 

The gilded Dome was beautiful and Harry spent far too much time looking up at it while Liam and Niall went over things with the officiant and the hotel wedding planner. It was either stare at the ceiling or stare at Louis and, well, one of those made him feel sort of lightheaded after a few minutes, while the other made him feel sad, bitter, and slightly nauseated all at once. It was an easy choice. 

Though staring at the ceiling left him alone with his thoughts and that road was one he’d been trying to avoid. Louis had apologized, but Harry had realized that it wasn’t enough, though he had no idea what could fix things at this point. Probably time. 

“Harry.” Louis’ stage whisper brought Harry out of his thoughts. He dropped his head down to find that Louis had stepped closer to him and that Niall and Liam had wandered down the aisle with the wedding planner. 

“Hmm?”

Louis flicked him in the forehead and Harry frowned and rubbed his hand across the sore spot. “I was saying that we’re supposed to eat with the happy couple in the Irish Pub downstairs. Do you want to go on down and get a beer while they finish up?”

Harry nodded and rubbed his forehead again, then followed Louis out of the room and down the hall to the elevator. 

One of the things that had bugged the hell out of Harry the first time they’d met, then again the second time they’d met, was that Louis filled silences. All of them. The entire drive up from college, Louis had run his mouth talking about himself or demanding information from Harry, and telling ridiculous stories about friends of friends that were likely complete fiction. On the plane when he took the seat next to Harry, Louis spent the next few hours filling Harry in on every single thing that Harry had never wanted to know. Over the last two years, as their friendship had grown, Louis lapsed into more comfortable silences now and then, though Harry could still count on him to talk his ear off most of the time. He was thankful for Louis’ need to fill the silence while they rode the elevator down to the pub. Otherwise, Harry thought he might open his mouth and spill some terrible secret. Like that he’d accidentally fallen in love with Louis and couldn’t find a way out.

Halfway listening to Louis talk and halfway listening to the voice in his head that wouldn’t shut up about how lovely Louis looked in his royal blue shirt, how the color made his eyes look even brighter, how that thing he did with his tongue when he paused to think—pressing it up against the roof of his mouth and the back of his teeth—shouldn’t be hot, Harry missed when Louis asked him a question. 

Louis repeated himself, “Are you seeing anyone?”

“I—No. I’m not.” Harry hadn’t wanted to answer, but the last thing he wanted was to explain _why_ he didn’t want to talk about it. 

“Yeah, neither am I.” Louis hummed and rocked on his heels. “I was seeing this archeologist, but it didn’t work out.”

“Anthropologist.”

“Yeah, that. How—”

“Liam told me.” Harry leaned over to press the button for the correct floor again. It was the longest elevator ride of his life. Louis started to respond, but the elevator slowed to a stop and the doors slid open. Harry hurried out of the doors before they’d finished opening and walked towards the pub.

Harry could hear Louis following him, but he didn’t slow his stride. If he reached the noise of the pub, he’d be safe. From what, he wasn’t sure. He made it to the bar before Louis caught up to him. They were sitting on stools and sipping Guinness before Louis spoke again.

“You want to do something for Thanksgiving since the newlyweds will be on their honeymoon? Like, I don’t know, _not_ eat turkey? Movie marathon?” 

Harry shook his head. “I’m going home. Leaving that Wednesday and staying through the weekend. My parents really want me to come, so they bought me a ticket.” He’d never been more thankful for Gemma. She’d harassed their parents into buying the ticket, he was sure of it, she’d probably offered up some of her airline miles as well. He couldn’t imagine spending a holiday alone with Louis.

Louis actually looked disappointed and that caused Harry’s stomach to flip. “That’s really nice of them. I’ll miss you though.” Louis smiled and sipped his beer, while Harry’s insides squirmed. “I mean, I kind of miss you anyway.”

“I know, Lou. I’m… I miss you too. I just needed some time.” The wedding would keep them busy all weekend, then Harry had the excuse of flying right back out again once they got home, so he’d be able to avoid Louis until the end of the month. Maybe things would be better after Thanksgiving. Harry caught Louis’ eye and smiled, he hoped he’d managed to seem earnest. He didn’t think he could handle talking about it anymore right now.

Louis nodded and pointed over Harry’s shoulder. “Our boys have arrived.”

Harry looked behind him and watched Niall and Liam come into the bar. They both looked so happy with massive grins on their faces, standing close to each other, Niall guiding Liam through the room with his hand on Liam’s back. Harry sighed and smiled at his friends. He and Louis stood up and followed them through the restaurant to a booth in the back.

●●●

During the ceremony, Harry managed to angle himself so that Louis was just out of his eyeline. He smiled and handed over the ring and performed his duties to the best of his ability. During the reception, Harry made small talk with Niall’s family, hugged Liam’s sisters each at least twice, and danced with Liam’s mom. He was forcing himself to have a good time and it was working, he’d managed to avoid interacting much with Louis all day. Harry had just passed Liam’s mom off to dance with her husband and was about to go to the bar for a glass of… something. Bourbon, maybe. With a slice of lemon on the side. When Louis appeared beside him.

He had that crooked grin on his face as he tilted his head and said, “Hi.”

“Hey.” Harry gave a quick nod and continued toward the bar. He placed his order and stood there, leaning his crossed arms onto the top of the bar. Louis signaled for the bartender to make it two, and stood close to Harry, facing him with one elbow on the bar.

“The ceremony was really nice. This place is… nice.”

“Yes. Nice.” Awkward small talk. Harry could feel his stomach starting to churn. 

The bartender handed over their drinks and they moved away from the bar. Harry saw a small high top table by the door and headed toward it, hoping that at least the small table between them would help. Of course it didn’t. Louis sidled up next to Harry, both of their backs to the corner so they could watch the rest of the room. 

“Weddings are so weird.” Louis sipped at his bourbon, then knocked the lemon off the side of the glass and into his drink. “There are so many old people. Not one person worth taking up to that fancy hotel room. I ought to go out and see what I can find after this reception is over.”

Harry’s stomach dropped and he felt sick. He turned to face Louis and crossed his arms. Honestly, the nerve of him. “Louis. I—I don’t want to talk about this with you.”

“Why not?”

“I just don’t want to talk about it.” Harry spun around and looked out the door he’d been standing next to. There was a balcony, and it was incredibly cold, so maybe Louis wouldn’t follow him there.

But of course, Louis followed. “Is this because we slept together?” 

Harry pushed through the door and walked to the railing, then stopped and shook his head before slowly turning to meet Louis’ eyes. 

“Yes.” Harry hissed. “This is because we slept together. Forgive me if I don’t feel like listening to you talk about your next conquest, now that I’ve been added to the list of guys you’ve fucked and forgotten.” 

It hurt to even admit that out loud, but it was the truth. It was bad enough to have been reduced to one of the men Louis had disappeared on the morning after, but to have to stand there and listen to him make plans to go out searching for someone else, when Harry was right there, was breaking his heart.

“Why can’t we get past this? Are we going to carry this around between us forever?”

“Forever, Louis? It just happened.” Harry scoffed and leaned his back against the ice cold railing.

“Just happened? It happenedlike, a month ago.”

Harry just stared and crossed his arms. How was a month forever? He hadn’t even finished painting the guest room.

Louis stepped closer, one of those smiles on his face, that meant he was probably going to attempt a joke and make an ass of himself at the same time. “Harry, you know how like, a year to a person is like, seven years to a dog?”

“Yeah?” 

Louis shrugged and twisted his lips to the side.

Harry’s mouth dropped open. “What?” He could feel the crease between his eyebrows deepening as he began to understand what Louis was saying. “Is one of us supposed to be a dog in this… scenario?”

Louis nodded, same stupid smirk on his face.

“Who? Which one of us is supposed to be the dog?”

“You are.”

“Me?” Harry’s voice came out high-pitched and squeaky, but he didn’t care. He stood up straight, using the extra few inches he had to his advantage, and looked down at Louis. “I cannot believe you. If anyone is a dog in this situation, it’s you. You want to act like what happened didn’t mean anything at all.”

“Of course it means something. I just don’t see why it has to mean everything.”

“Because it does. And you know it. It’s a big deal, Louis, and you are fully aware of that. If it wasn’t a big deal, it wouldn’t have changed anything between us. If it wasn’t a big deal, I wouldn’t feel like shit every time I’m around you. If it wasn’t a big deal, it wouldn’t have ruined everything.”

Louis ran his hand through his hair and huffed in confusion, “I don’t get it, Harry. We talked about this and we both agreed it was a mistake.”

“It was. It was the worst mistake I’ve ever made.” Harry quickly agreed, then to make sure Louis understood how much of a mistake it had been, he continued, counting on his fingers, “The top four mistakes in order are sleeping with you, talking to you in that bookstore that day, letting you sit next to me on that plane six years ago, and driving up from college with you.”

Louis looked hurt at that and part of Harry wanted to take it back, goddamn it. Harry looked away as Louis wondered, “So what, we can’t be friends? Is that it? Do you want me to apologize again? _I’m sorry._ What else do you want from me?”

“Not one thing, Louis. I want nothing from you.” That was a complete lie, but what Harry wanted, Louis wasn’t willing or able to give.

“Fine. You know what, that’s fine.” Louis threw his hands up and turned to go, but then changed his mind and faced Harry again, pointing his finger at Harry’s chest. “Let me just make sure that you understand this though. I _did not_ go over there that night with the intention of fucking you. I went over there as a friend, because I was worried about you, because I cared about you. And you, you were so upset, crying and asking me to hold you and your eyes were so, big and sad—”

“Are you saying it was a pity fuck, Louis?”

“No, I—”

“Fuck you.” Harry shoved past him, throwing his shoulder into Louis’ as he passed by, and yanking the balcony door open so he could try to lose himself inside the banquet hall. He’d thought he was angry at Louis before, but this was another level. The anger mixed with the heartache and together they made this horrible cocktail of… despair. Harry shuddered and his breath caught in his throat. He needed a drink. Cold air swirled around his feet as Louis obviously decided to rejoin the reception as well. Harry could sense him standing just behind and to his right. There was a spot by the bar and if Harry could just get around the dance floor— 

“Thank you all for coming.” Niall’s voice, amplified by the speakers, carried into every corner of the room, freezing Harry right where he stood. “We just wanted to say that today has been just, well, really wonderful.”

Liam leaned over to speak into the microphone in his new husband’s hand. “Really, it’s been the best day. And it means so much to us that all of you were able to travel here to be with us. So, thank you.”

Liam leaned back away from the microphone and whispered into Niall’s ear. Niall chuckled and grinned as he said, “One last thing, we’d like to propose a toast to Louis and Harry.” 

Liam finished the toast with a wide grin. “If either of us had found either of them remotely attractive, we probably wouldn’t be here today. To Louis and Harry.” 

Niall and Liam raised their champagne flutes into the air and everyone around the room did the same, laughing and cheering and joining in to toast to the newlyweds’ two friends, who had brought them together through pure happenstance. 

Harry clenched his jaw and tried to force a smile, but all he could do was stand there, holding back tears, and wish that the day was over. As soon as attention was elsewhere, he grabbed a bottle of champagne from the bar and headed for the elevators. He spent the rest of the evening drunk in his hotel room and caught an early flight on standby the next morning. 

Harry went home to Chicago for Thanksgiving the following Wednesday. Gemma spent the night before the flight in Harry’s newly decorated guest room and they took a taxi together to the airport; their mom picked them up at O’Hare. 

When Harry flew into JFK on the following Saturday, he took a taxi home and spent the entire drive thinking about the second time he met Louis and the things he’d said about never taking anyone to the airport. He should have known then.

●●●

After the newlyweds returned from their honeymoon, they invited Harry over for dinner. They hadn’t seen each other since the wedding and Harry had missed them, especially Liam. He’d had Gemma to talk to about Louis, but it wasn’t the same. Liam _knew_ Louis and knew them together. Maybe he could provide a different perspective on the situation.

They managed cocktails and dinner without any of the three of them mentioning Louis, but Harry knew it was coming. From the glances Niall kept giving Liam as they cleared away the plates and disappeared into the kitchen, Harry figured they’d bring out the uncomfortable conversation when they brought out dessert. There were a few dishes left on the table, so Harry gathered them up to take to the kitchen, but then he heard Liam say Louis’ name and Harry froze in place, afraid to move, but too curious to walk away.

“...don’t care how he feels, Ni. He’s been a complete asshole about this. Look at Harry. He’s clearly devastated by this whole thing.”

“I know, babe. I’m just saying that he’s… Louis isn’t doing well, is all.”

“Yeah, well, serves him right. If I’m still mad about that dog comment, I know Harry is. Louis _should_ feel like shit.”

“He… I thought… I don’t know, babe, I thought… We both thought for so long that all they needed was a little push and that would be it. And he misses Harry. So much. He’s awful to be around lately, all he does is mope, and he won’t talk about it. The last time we hung out to watch the game, it was miserable. And he hasn’t been seeing anyone. I don’t think he’s seen anyone at all since he broke it off with that archaeologist.”

It was a struggle for Harry to back away from the kitchen. He quietly set the dishes he was carrying back down on the table and tiptoed to the bathroom, where he locked the door and leaned against it, trying to breathe. Behind his tightly closed eyes, Harry watched himself over the past month or so since that night. Somehow he’d imagined that he’d been hiding it, keeping his heartache to himself, making sure he was busy, continuing on with his work, his hobbies, his life, just without the one person who’d managed to become the most important part of it all. 

Carefully, so he didn’t get his shirt wet and let on to Niall and Liam what he’d really been doing in the bathroom, Harry splashed cold water on his face. After patting his face dry with one of Liam’s fancy guest towels, Harry leaned forward to stare at himself in the mirror. He’d have to work on being more convincing. After a few seconds he opened the door and went back to join Niall and Liam for dessert.

●●● 

Once Harry had realized that he was in love with Louis, he took a look back over their friendship and was surprised to see that their relationship, at least looking down on it, was never just friendship. They’d opened their hearts to each other from that first lunch together, spilled all the secrets that they’d never told anyone else, and kept it up for almost two years. In his entire life, Harry had never had a friend that he talked to every single day, or that he spent time with that often. Hell, he lived with Liam and they didn’t see that much of each other. 

The worst part was when he thought about his birthday that year and the entire day they’d spent together. It seemed so obvious in retrospect that there was something else there, but Louis didn’t seem to think so and that made all the difference in the world.

●●●

On one of the brighter days in mid-December, Harry walked down to the empty lot where they sold Christmas trees. He purposefully avoided the place he’d visited the year before with Louis and he bought a different type of tree, a Frasier Fir instead of a Blue Spruce. He didn’t bother to haggle with the salesperson, just paid them in cash and hauled his tree off. Or, well, he tried to. It was a lot more difficult to get it home this time. 

By the time Harry had pulled it down the sidewalk, through the lobby, up the stairs, and into his apartment, it was almost bare on one side. Getting it into the tree stand was like a battle of will: Harry versus The Tree. It was a close fight, both sides took some hard hits, including the loss of a vase that had once belonged to Harry’s grandmother, but in the end Harry was victorious. Sort of. The tree was in the stand, but it was in the corner, partially supported by the two walls. He put off decorating until the next day.

While Harry was halfway under his bed, searching for the box of unbreakable decorations, his phone rang. He ignored it, figuring he’d call whoever it was back later, as soon as he’d finished his war on the Christmas tree. The box of unbreakable ornaments was behind a box of summer clothes and it took Harry a few minutes to wiggle out from under his bed. 

Once he was free, Harry sat with his back against the bedside table, thankful that his hair was long enough to put completely up in a bun, and ignored the pang in his chest when he thought about the year before, sitting on the floor while Louis carefully pulled dust bunnies from his curls. He opened the box in the living room, pulled out the lights, and began to string them along the tree. He’d bought himself some expensive hot cocoa and made a mugful before getting started on the ornaments. There was a layer of newspaper under the lights, so Harry put it aside and reached into the box. He pulled his hand back as if it had been burned when he realized that at least half of Louis’ mercury glass ornaments had somehow ended up in the box with his vintage Scandinavian ornaments. He carefully folded the box shut and carried it to his room to shove it back under the bed. The tree won that round. 

Harry took a short trip to the kitchen to pour a splash of peppermint schnapps into his cocoa and sat back down on the couch to zone out in front of the television and watch the Jets beat the Vikings. At halftime he went out to the store to get beer and pick up a pizza, when he got home he realized he’d never checked his voicemail from earlier that day. He put his phone on speaker and pressed play on his voicemail, then bent over to put the beer in the fridge. He almost dropped the six-pack when Louis’ voice, tinny and cracked because of the recording, rang out through his kitchen.

“Hi, it’s me. Um, I’d thought I’d remind you that it _is_ the holiday season. The traditional season of charity and forgiveness. And also, though it’s not as widely known, it’s also the season of groveling. So, um, if you’d just give me a call, Harry. I’d like to do some of the traditional Christmas groveling. Call me. Please.”

Harry hit the delete button, probably a little too forcefully because his phone skittered across the countertop. He left it there and took his beer and pizza to the couch.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to forgive Louis, in fact, in some ways Harry thought that he already had. Though he was incredibly pissed off that he’d had to haul that tree all the way home by himself. Other than the tree though, it was simply that he couldn’t forget his feelings or that night. Love wasn’t something that Harry had a lot of experience with, just Joe and one boyfriend in college. And one sided love was something that Harry knew absolutely nothing about. He just knew that he wouldn’t be able to handle a friendship like the one that he and Louis had before. Listening to Louis talk about dating other people or sleeping with other people… Harry just didn’t have it in him to be that person. And yeah, he was angry, but not so much with Louis anymore. Now he was mad at himself for falling for someone who would never love him back, at least, not in the same way.

●●● 

Filling his time hadn’t been as difficult as he’d expected. Harry had taken on a few extra assignments at work and with the research that required, he was busy enough. He’d bought himself a new laptop for Christmas and, since Niall and Liam had gone skiing in the Poconos, Gemma had flown to the Caribbean with her new boyfriend, and his parents were in Chicago, Harry was all alone and decided to fill the time with work.

It was Christmas Eve and Harry had managed to distract himself all day long, almost forgetting that it was Louis’ birthday, even though it still sat in the back of his head and was still written on his calendar. By late afternoon, he was sitting at his desk in the guest room, typing away, when his phone rang. He didn’t bother to look, something told him it was Louis, so he ignored it. But when the notification went off that he had a voicemail, Harry took a quick break from work, thinking he’d listen to it quickly and delete it.

“Hey, it’s me. Um, it’s my birthday and I… I really want to talk to you. You never answer when I call, I’m not sure why I keep trying, but… I do. I miss you. I wish you’d just talk to me.”

Harry deleted it and went back to work. Ten minutes later, he was sprawled on his bed, work forgotten, while he stared at the ceiling and wondered when Louis would give up and stop calling or when he’d stop feeling horrible every time he didn’t answer or deleted a voicemail. He didn’t want to think about Louis. It was depressing and Christmas was bad enough, and probably three times as horrible being alone. 

Harry’d had enough of thinking about Louis during the last week which he’d spent cancelling all of the reservations he’d made for Louis’ birthday and returning all of the gifts he’d already bought for him. The tickets for that day's Giants game had gone to one of Harry’s coworkers and, thankfully, Niall and Liam had gladly taken the Mets season tickets off of Harry’s hands, they’d given him what he’d paid for them, and taken him out to dinner before they’d left town. 

Harry reached for his remote and turned his TV on to ESPN to check the score. Since he hadn’t gone to the game and he’d been working all day, he hadn’t bothered to watch. The Giants had lost at home and Harry felt like that summed up his mood for that day. He turned the TV off and went to find something to eat for dinner.

●●● 

A few days after Christmas, Harry showered and shaved and dried his hair, got dressed in his favorite jeans and sweater, and bundled up to go look for a new pair of boots. Liam and Niall were back from their ski holiday and Liam was supposed to meet Harry for coffee before they went shopping, so when his phone rang as he was putting on his coat, Harry answered it, assuming it was Liam. It wasn’t.

“Hey, Li.” Harry mumbled into the phone with one arm in a sleeve, fumbling around behind himself for the other.

“Hey, um… It’s me. What, um, what are you doing?” Harry froze when he heard Louis’ voice, halfway in his coat.

Harry cleared his throat and tried to be calm as he answered, “I was just on my way out.”

“Where are you going?”

“To meet Liam. What do you want, Louis?”

“Nothing, um… I just… I just called to say I’m sorry.”

“Okay.” The silence stretched between them and it seemed like Harry could feel the seconds ticking in his heart. It was too much. A simple apology wasn’t enough and yet it was too much. “I—I gotta go.”

“Wait. Wait a second, please.” Louis begged and Harry couldn’t say no. Though he didn’t say anything. He just listened and waited for Louis to continue. “Um, what are you doing for New Years? Are you going to the Matthews’ party? Because I don’t have a date. And if you don’t have a date, you know, I mean, we said that we could be together on New Years. Like last year.”

Harry squeezed his eyes shut and took a deep breath. “I can’t do this, Louis. I’m not—I’m not your consolation prize. Bye.” Harry hung up and blinked his eyes rapidly, pocketed his phone and headed out to meet Liam. He’d just skip the party this year. Who wanted to be the single guy in a room full of drunk couples anyway.

●●● 

Harry hadn’t even wanted to go out on New Year’s Eve, but Liam and Niall had insisted, promising that Louis wasn’t going to be there. The Matthews’ party was the same crowd as the year before, but Harry spent the evening feeling slightly nauseated and wondering if he was coming down with something. When he saw the chef bring out the crab cakes and his stomach lurched, he realized it wasn’t an illness. Some guy from Liam’s office spent about twenty minutes trying to convince Harry to let him buy him a drink at the open bar and Harry finally excused himself when he finished his second bourbon. He wasn’t in the mood for champagne. 

The party went on around him as Harry drifted from corner to corner, making conversation with a few people, avoiding the terrace completely, and eating nothing from the heavy hor d'oeuvres table. It was closing in on midnight and the prospect of ringing in the New Year with a room full of people that Harry didn’t want to look at or talk to was depressing. He wanted to go home and said as much to Liam, but Liam was right, he’d never get a taxi at this point in the evening, so he stuck around. 

People started gathering together for the countdown. Harry watched from his seat at the bar as two by two, couples found each other, and held tight as they swayed to the music. It was too much. He couldn’t do it. So he found Niall and Liam to say goodbye.

“I’m just gonna go.”

Liam reached for Harry and stroked his outer arm. “No, Harry, stay. It’s almost midnight.”

“Yeah, no.” Harry shook his head. “The thought of not kissing anyone at midnight is just… I’m just gonna go.”

“I’ll kiss you, Harry.” Niall sweetly offered, but Harry smiled and backed away. He’d walk if he had to, he’d worn his heavy coat, but maybe he’d find a cab. 

“I love you guys. Happy New Year.” 

Liam and Niall kissed Harry on either cheek and told him to call them when he got home. Thankfully, the coat room wouldn’t be crowded at this time of night, so Harry made his way there while digging around in his pocket for his ticket stub. 

Harry turned the corner toward the coat room and stopped short. Louis was standing there. Chest heaving, hair damp with sweat, he stood there in his converse, his old sweatpants with the paint on the knee, and his Chicago Bulls sweatshirt under his heavy coat. Harry stood there frozen, watching him, barely able to breathe and trying to decide if he should turn and run back into the party. 

Louis strode over to him with his brow creased and his lips pursed. He stopped right in front of Harry, breathing heavily he held up one finger in a gesture for Harry to wait, and Harry was momentarily shocked, unable to move as he stared at him.

When Louis was able to speak, he started with, “I love you.”

And that was enough to get Harry moving again. He hurried past Louis and hoped that he could grab his coat and maybe outrun him. Louis seemed like he wouldn’t make it far if Harry took off in a sprint. 

“Please, Harry, wait.” Louis panted as he grabbed at Harry’s sleeve. “Please let me…”

Harry spun around, absolutely livid and ready to scream. _I love you._ What the fuck. “What do you want me to say, Louis? How do you expect me to respond to this… half-ass declaration?”

“I mean… how about you say that you love me too?” And he looked so expectant. Like it was perfectly acceptable to turn up, say three words, and everything would suddenly be alright between them. As if months of Harry’s world being shattered and turned on it’s head could be erased because he said _I love you._

“How about… I’m leaving.” Harry turned back towards the coat room. He could still make it down the stairs before the ball dropped.

But of course, Louis followed, calling after him, “Come on, Harry. How can you just leave? Doesn’t what I said mean anything?”

Mid-step, Harry froze. He spun on his heel and advanced towards Louis and he knew he must be quite intimidating, if Louis’ face was any indication. Harry practically growled, “How can I just leave? Fuck you, Louis. You’re the expert on leaving. You figure it out.” And he strode away, leaving Louis speechless. 

Luckily Harry’s striped coat stood out in a sea of black and he was able to retrieve it quickly. The elevator opened as soon as he pushed the down button and Harry heaved a sigh of relief. He was going to go home and take a bubble bath, he didn’t care if he had to ring in the New Year walking home or riding in the back of a taxi. Harry bundled up in his coat, hat and gloves on the way down in the elevator. It was a long walk, so Harry hit the sidewalk in the direction of his apartment.

A walk was always a good way to clear his mind and Harry enjoyed them most of the time. Tonight was a little different. _I love you._ Unbelievable, really. As in, Harry did not believe him. Louis had months to figure his shit out and what? Conveniently decided that tonight was the night? If it were true… No. Harry couldn’t even entertain the idea. He needed to get home. 

A shout rang out behind him and he’d recognize that voice anywhere. Harry stopped and waited for Louis. He was running to catch up, so Harry crossed his arms and looked around trying not to make eye contact with Louis as he approached. He must have run the entire way, he looked like he needed to sit down. 

Harry figured he’d go ahead and get it over with. “I’m sorry, Louis. Look, I know it’s New Year’s Eve and I know you’re lonely, but you can’t do this. You can’t just show up and tell me you love me and expect everything to be okay. It’s not okay. It doesn’t work like that.” 

Louis panted, his hands on his knees, “How does it work then? God, I’m out of shape. I gotta start running or something.”

“I don’t know how it works, but not like this. Not like the last few months.”

Louis stood up, chest still heaving as he tried to catch his breath, every exhale misting in front of his face. “I’m sorry, Harry. Please, just listen for a minute, okay?”

Harry nodded.

“I’ve been an asshole. A real asshole to you. And I knew it, alright? I knew it. But I thought that if I pushed you, you know, like I used to. Like I did on the ride up from college or on the plane that time, that you’d push back. I wanted you back… I wanted things back the way they were. The thought of a relationship with you scared the shit out of me. Like I was actually sick for a day after… You know. That dinner. That—” Louis stepped closer and whispered, “The sex? It was amazing. And I know that’s not important right now, but it was for me. It was frightening. Thinking about you like that. Connecting with you like that. Because you’re my best friend. I was yours, right?”

Harry nodded again, but refused to look at Louis. He couldn’t watch him while he talked, it was one of his weaknesses.

“I just wanted, like ever since we started hanging out that January, I wanted to be with you all the time. You became my favorite person within like two weeks of really knowing you. And I know you said it doesn’t matter, but I love you. I do. And I’m sorry that I figured it out today. Because I love you. Everything about you.” 

Louis took a step closer and reached for Harry’s hand where it was folded under his crossed arms. Harry let him tug it loose. 

“I love the way you order food in restaurants. I love that you made me help you move that tree around a dozen different times last Christmas. I love that you’re always worried about me being cold and that you carry extra gloves and beanies in your coat pockets. I love that you get this crease between your eyebrows when you’re looking at me like I’m crazy. I love when you wash my clothes that I leave at your apartment because then they smell like you, and I love that you are the _last_ person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night and the _first_ person I want to talk to when I wake up every morning.” 

Louis grabbed for Harry’s other hand and squeezed it. “And it’s _not_ because I’m lonely or because it’s New Year’s Eve. I came here tonight because I was walking around town, feeling like shit, wishing I was with you at this stupid party, and I saw this couple kissing. And, Harry, look at me, please.” 

Harry met Louis’ gaze and he could feel the tears welling up in his eyes, just about to the point of spilling over. 

Louis smiled, the best smile, Harry’s favorite smile, the one with the crinkly eyes. “It was like the story you told me about Rose. I saw that couple and I wanted to point and say _love_ because that’s what it was and it broke my heart. I’m standing there on a deserted sidewalk realizing that I’m in love with you and there were no taxis. And I had to get here. Because it hit me that I’m in fucking love with you and that I’d probably fucked it all up. So I ran all the way here to tell you. Because I guess when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want the rest of your life to start right away.”

Harry choked out a sob and tried to take a breath so he could talk. “This is so typical of you, Louis. You open your mouth and say shit like that and you make it impossible for me to hate you.” Tears were streaming down Harry’s face, he didn’t know when they’d started, but he didn’t care because Louis was wiping them away with his thumbs and pulling him close. “You’re such an asshole. I can’t believe this.” Harry buried his face against Louis’ neck and sniffled. 

After a few minutes, Harry lifted his head and pulled back enough that he could look Louis in the eye. “I don’t want you to think that everything is okay now, because it’s not. I do love you though. I want you to know that. But, um, I think we have some shit to work out.”

“Okay. Yeah, you’re right.” Louis wrapped a finger around one of Harry’s curls and tugged. “Can I kiss you?”

Harry nodded and leaned down, meeting Louis’ lips. 

**2007**

It didn’t take them long to work things out considering they’d practically been dating for two years without _actually dating,_ and three months later, Louis and Harry officially moved in together. Three months because it took them that long to find a new apartment that they both approved of. 

In June, they returned to Boston with their friends and family for their own wedding celebration.

For Christmas that year, Louis surprised Harry with a tiny calico kitten with a little bow around her neck and Harry squealed with delight, then ran out of the room and returned with a tiny black and white kitten that he’d hidden in their guest room. 

Three years later, they started filling out adoption paperwork, and today, you can still find them in New York, in the same apartment with their two fat cats and their five year old daughter. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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